


Outliving Hope

by her_majesty_wears_jeans



Category: Winx Club
Genre: A Little Canon Divergence, Canon Related, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Family, Fix-It of Sorts, Flashbacks, Friendship, Gen, Guilt, Lots of Angst, Other Characters Not Mentioned in The Tags, Post-Season/Series 03, Pre-Canon, Reunions, Sad and Happy, War, aggressively adoption positive, all the feels, as in everything is terrible but at least it makes sense now, cherry-picking the canon, hinted ptsd, other relationships not mentioned in the tags, post the movie the secret of the lost kingdom, public service and self-indulgence aren't mutually exclusive, summa summarum: out with the plot holes and in with the angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:22:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 37,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24725953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/her_majesty_wears_jeans/pseuds/her_majesty_wears_jeans
Summary: The aftermath of The Secret of the Lost Kingdom in a way that makes sense. Meaning this fic remembers that Griffin and Saladin exist, acknowledges that Marion and Oritel basically came back from the dead, and assumes Bloom wouldn't be quite so comfortable around people she hasn't seen since she was a baby.
Relationships: Bloom & Faragonda (Winx Club), Bloom & Marion (Winx Club), Daphne & Marion (Winx Club), Faragonda & Griffin (Winx Club), Faragonda/Hagen (Winx Club), Griffin & Marion (Winx Club), Griffin/Valtor | Baltor (Winx Club), Marion/Oritel (Winx Club), mentions of Bloom/Sky (Winx Club)
Comments: 29
Kudos: 84





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've been at this for the past nine months or so, so I really needed to post this today even if it's super late and I should be asleep xd 
> 
> Nevertheless, The Secret of the Lost Kingdom is a mess, and I'm still bitter we haven't gotten a spin-off about the Company of Light. Here's my attempt at fixing both of those. Be warned, there will be lots of feels.
> 
> A massive thank you to DarkPoisonousLove who was always cheering me on and ready to talk plotlines through with me!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marion's finally free from Obsidian, along with Oritel and the rest of their kingdom. That doesn't erase the hurt, though, especially once Marion meets her daughters.

_The day couldn’t have been better. Some fluffy clouds were slowly making their way across the blue sky, sheer enough not to really block the sun even when they got in its way. It was warm, but the gentle breeze brought a refreshing gust of cooler air every now and then._

_For Marion, the beautiful weather was just a bonus, however. She would’ve been just as happy in the pouring rain, though it would’ve meant she would have had to come up with something else for her and Daphne to do on her rare moment of freedom._

_Pushing her wings to flutter with a little faster pace, Marion raced over the gloriously green hills, her eyes on the flora below her, in search of her daughter. She had lost sight of Daphne a few minutes ago after they’d passed the lake and crossed to the forest. She doubted she’d fallen far back – it was more likely that with her slender, fragmented wings and blueish-green dress, Daphne just blended well into the canopy._

_As if on cue, Marion finally spotted Daphne a little ahead of her, zooming between the trees with speed that would’ve had Marion worried if she hadn’t seen her daughter do it several times. After some deliberation, Marion abandoned her own plan of flying straight over the trees and descended to the same level Daphne was on, having to put all her focus into both following Daphne’s trail and avoiding smacking into one of the tree trunks she was zigzagging in between._

_Daphne noticed her before long, glancing back with a gleeful smile before speeding up. Marion had always been a fast flyer, but Daphne had inherited that trait, too, so Marion was forced to do the same, even when her turns grew sharper as she had less time to process the obstacles on her path._

_They raced across a small meadow hidden in the middle of the deciduous trees and around a hill, coming by and following a river that ended in a small lake surrounded by jagged rocks on several sides. Daphne maintained her lead, but Marion had managed to gain ground on her a little as she only needed to follow her daughter instead of constantly analyzing their surroundings for the best route._

_Looking up, Marion had to wonder where Daphne was planning to swerve next. They were reaching the other side of the lake that had nothing but tall boulders leaning against each other in a formation that looked not only impenetrable but dangerous with its sharp, ragged edges. They would have to go over it, but Daphne was cutting it awfully close with changing her course._

_Marion slowed down. Her daughter was hardly reckless by nature, but there was no way she hadn’t noticed the roadblock ahead of them. Her hesitation had turned into bafflement, and as it morphed into worry, she opened her mouth to call out a warning._

_“Daphne!”_

_Daphne didn’t seem to have heard her as she only straightened her hands in front of her and continued towards two of the largest stones. Marion had already stopped a safe distance away, though close enough to see Daphne fly straight towards the hard surface – but instead of ramming into it, she disappeared out of sight._

_“Daphne?”_

_Marion hadn’t flown as fast during their entire race as she now rushed over the boulders, dizzy with relief as she saw Daphne waiting for her on the other side. She was standing on the ground and seemed completely unharmed, judging by the wide grin she greeted her mother with._

_Marion landed next to her, unable to stop herself from running her hands along Daphne’s face and shoulders. “Honey, you scared me.”_

_Daphne’s eyes widened, and her smile turned sheepish. “I’m sorry, mom.”_

_Marion waved her hand, evening out her breath from their race and especially the more than exiting finish. It was no matter as long as Daphne was all right. “How did you know there was a crack between the rocks? I’ve never noticed it.”_

_“A nymph must know her realm”, Daphne said lightly, fluttering her wings as if she was flicking fairy dust on her mother._

_Placing her hands on her hips, Marion feigned offense. “Are you suggesting I don’t know our land as well as you? May I remind you, my dearest daughter, that I’ve lived here longer?”_

_Daphne threw her head back as she laughed. “Yes, mama, I know. But… well, the Queen has her duties. And you can only see so far from the palace windows.”_

_Daphne was smirking, but behind the playful gleam in her amber eyes, Marion could see how carefully she treaded, mindful of the line she was toeing, ready to retreat the moment it got crossed. Marion knew very well how considerate her daughter could be, but witnessing it never failed to fill her with pride and love. Determined to reward Daphne for the effort, Marion kept drawing the line back with all the force she could muster, Daphne’s brilliant smile sheltering her from the lurking negative thoughts._

_“Is that a challenge I’m hearing?” she asked, indulging in the rare opportunity for banter._

_Daphne shrugged in mock-disinterest. “Only if you take the bait.”_

_Marion laughed. “Oh, you’re on! This time, I’ll go first.”_

_They spend the following hour flying around the forest, alternating between bursts of speed and intricate spirals, avoiding tree trunks, and testing which one of them could fly closer to the lake surface without causing ripples._

_They hadn’t had a chance to do anything like that in a long while; Marion was nearly delirious from both the happiness Daphne exuded and the feel of the wind in her own hair. Flying was something she had tried to do with Daphne as often as possible when Daphne had been younger. It had been a chance to bond over something else than the etiquette for a change, in addition to improving a fairy’s agility. Marion had flown zigzag on the courtyard numerous times in her life, but she’d always preferred the real forest to the identical, neat-shaped bushes. Once she’d grown old enough that hitting the architecture would harm it, her parents had given in, allowing her to leave the yard, provided she stayed close to the castle in case of an emergency._

_Marion regretted following the courtesy rule as she suddenly spotted a castle worker riding towards them. She peeked over her shoulder to Daphne who was, luckily, immersed in her somersault routine; Marion was as displeased about the idea of disturbing Daphne as she was to be disturbed herself. While the man planted his feet on the ground, Marion did the same, not transforming back in hopes that it would make the man think twice before trying to whisk her away._

_“Is something the matter, Alter?”_

_“Your Majesty”, the advisor greeted with a quick bow. He sounded out of breath, which caused Marion to frown in confusion. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but you’re desperately needed in the library. It’s urgent.”_

_“Of course”, Marion agreed despite the sigh that had escaped her. “What is it about?”_

_The look on Alter’s face had Marion worried. The unevenness of his tone, coupled with the choice of using a horse instead of crossing the rather short distance on foot, ringing the alarm bells Marion had been trying not to turn on in her head._

_“We received word of an attack to Solaria by a powerful dark wizard. Given the news of other similar incidences across the Magic Dimension, His Majesty King Radius is requesting our help in determining whether the attacks are connected and whether the wizard should be considered a threat.”_

_Marion nodded. She’d heard of the random hits during the past few months, but even the most recent one had been far from Domino, so she hadn’t paid them much mind. The increase in their number and proximity, however, was distressing. Especially if the details she’d thought had been exaggerated proved to be true._

_“I’ll come straight away.”_

_“Mom?”_

_Slightly startled, Marion turned around to find Daphne standing behind her with a wary expression. Her voice had carried out several questions from genuine confusion to serious concern._

_“It’s all right”, Marion reassured._

_Daphne accepted the attempt, but it was clear she didn’t believe it. She didn’t join Marion on the flight back to the castle, either, which was an even bigger sign she’d read the tense situation and knew she wouldn’t be consulted in the matter. Marion was pleased about and proud of Daphne’s insight, even though it didn’t help ease her mind._

_She hadn’t said anything, taking the news seriously but with the kind of placating smile she’d been taught to use in order not to alarm people outside the inner circle. But she didn’t like the feeling she had, and it wasn’t just because this dark wizard had interrupted her time with her daughter. It was her Dragon, warning her against something so grave she couldn’t even put it into words. She knew Oritel sensed her unease as she tried reasoning with Radius, suggesting they didn’t sound the alarms before they had concrete proof of the wizard’s intention to harm them. Marion knew she was lying, though. The dark magic was already infiltrating their kingdom and home. She just had no idea how drastic the separation of her family would eventually become._

* * *

It was the most disconcerting feeling, Marion thought, when every glimpse at the teenage girl who shared her hair color made her stomach simultaneously flip and sink to her toes. Then again, the disconnect felt almost normal compared to how odd it felt to be in her own form again, to be able to move. Her body felt so strange that despite the fact that Oritel hadn’t let go of her hand since he’d first grabbed it, Marion kept glancing down to make sure her senses weren’t playing tricks on her but he was indeed still holding her.

“So”, she spoke, comforted when Oritel immediately turned to look at her like he’d recognized her voice even though it sounded unfamiliar to her own ears, “where are we?”

The group of young fairies and soldiers – all too young to have gone against the people they must have faced, and _won_ – turned to look at her then, too.

“Domino”, said a boy with glasses as thin-framed as himself. His streamlined answer was elaborated on by a pink-haired girl next to him, who actually seemed to be speaking mostly to herself.

“It seems that creating an interdimensional portal to resurface from a void is equally as complex as it was maintaining a sense of direction while introducing a physical form into abstract conditions. That’s interesting.”

“Tecna, not now, please”, sighed another girl, her hand awkwardly wrapped around her stomach and holding onto her left side. “I’m sure I’m not the only one who doesn’t really care as long as we’re not in Obsidian anymore.”

Marion couldn’t help agreeing with her as most of the group echoed the sentence, so she tuned out the rest of the conversation. They were _free_ ; the thought almost brought tears to her eyes. The only thing rivaling the wave of relief and happiness was the pain that shot through her when she looked at her daughter, unsure if she had even recognized her without Daphne.

And Daphne… her sweet, clever, brave little girl who had first acted so beyond her years and then suffered from that sacrifice so horribly that Marion knew she could only ever be considered “little” in her eyes anymore. She squeezed Oritel’s hand tighter, hating herself for being even the tiniest bit relieved Daphne hadn’t been able to stay as the pain of seeing her first-born but not being able to hold her was-

Well, it was as paralyzing as the pain of watching the baby she’d last placed in her big sister’s arms now lean into the side of an unfamiliar young man, hugging herself and avoiding eye contact. Marion wanted nothing more than to run to her and never let go, but although Bloom had made it clear she was excited to meet them, Marion understood why the girl stayed back.

She was a stranger to her own daughter.

Unable to keep her eyes off Bloom since they were the only part of her that could touch her, Marion studied Bloom. She’d last seen her as a baby, yet she was just as perfect as she had been then. Where Daphne had taken after Oritel, Bloom seemed to have taken after her. She had her mother’s hair and eyes, the shape of her nose familiarly distinctive, and she was more on the petite side like Marion was unlike the rest of their family.

The longer Marion looked, the clearer the similarities became. She took them in, trying to memorize even the smallest of details, like the pastel shades of Bloom’s fairy form that complimented her skin tone, the freckles on her shoulders that were so faint Marion wasn’t entirely sure they weren’t just dirt, and the one lock of hair that seemed to bend in the opposite direction than the others around it. Bloom would’ve looked like any one of her friends to Marion if she hadn’t known it was her, but now that she knew, the idea that she wouldn’t have recognized her seemed absurd. 

It was the truth, though. She wouldn’t have been looking, and if she’d noticed the resemblance, she would’ve turned away. Her daughters had been dead.

“Are you all right?”

Startled out of her thoughts that had slowly been spiraling out of control – Oritel must have seen it as he was better at reading people than he wanted everyone to know – Marion turned to look at her husband. 

“Yes”, she answered before thinking, giving him the depressed-yet-meant-to-be-reassuring smile he had surely seen hundreds of times. She’d never had the luxury of being able to voice her problems out in the open – something Oritel still disagreed on with her, but he had seemed to quickly learn to distinguish the degree of which she meant the word by her tone and body language.

Marion lessened the power with which she was gripping his hand.

Answering her smile with a dry but fond one of his own, Oritel tugged her closer so that she was fully facing him, reaching to idly push a piece of her hair behind her ear. The fervor in his gaze captivated her attention fully, reminding her things were better now. Truly, she was more all right than she could’ve been. A short while ago she had still thought she’d never see her daughters again, hadn’t been sure if she’d ever get to touch her husband again.

Curling her fingers around Oritel’s forearms so that she was cradling them, she debated resting her head against his chest and listening to the beat of his heart so she could be sure he really was back. Being publicly affectionate had been on top of the list of things Marion, already as a child, had learned were frowned upon and thus never grown comfortable with, but now, her chest hollow with longing for time she’d been robbed of, and bitterness about a war that had cost her her daughter, she let Oritel draw her closer.

His lips lingered on her hairline, as if not yet ready to part from their beloved, while also allowing his familiar scent to soothe her. Still, Marion found her thoughts getting away from her and the man in whose arms she currently was, and towards the boy who currently had his arm around her daughter.

Who was he? He wore a uniform similar to the other boys’, with a crest Marion imagined belonged to Red Fountain – and the idea that apparently at least Magix had been spared from the destruction that had threatened their entire universe eased her mind a great deal. He carried a sword he held in a relaxed but confident grip like he was accustomed to the weapon – which he probably was if he was a specialist student like she suspected. That most likely meant he was either nobility training to become a leader or a commoner with something or someone to protect in the future. 

She wasn’t interested in his heritage at the moment, however. Marion stepped back just far enough that she could observe their daughter with her suitor, while still keeping her own hold of Oritel. The important question wasn’t who the young man was or where he came from but who he was to Bloom.

Bloom was resting her head on his shoulder, while his arm was curled around her waist, fingers gently stroking her hip. The minimal distance between them painted a clear picture of the level of intimacy the pair shared, but Marion tried to push her fears aside and find comfort in the idea that at least Bloom hadn’t been utterly alone.

Marion swept her gaze over the group of students she reckoned she owed everything to. They’d returned her to her daughter, which made her curious about whether they had a bigger role in Bloom’s life. Whether they were strangers brought together by coincidence or duty, or if Bloom considered them family.

The word slit something inside her, but as torn as Marion was, she hoped Bloom had found someone to replace the family she’d never had in Domino. Marion had no idea what had happened to her daughters other than what Daphne had explained a moment ago – a brief story Marion assumed had been cut to spare time and her parents’ feelings, about how she’d sent baby Bloom through a portal somewhere that the witches would never think to look for her.

But where had that portal landed her? Marion knew Daphne’s plan had worked at least to an extent; seeing that the witches had been trapped in Obsidian as much as Oritel and she had, Bloom had been free of them. Marion hadn’t had the strength to fantasize about a world where Bloom had survived, but now that she knew that it hadn’t meant her child abandoned on a destroyed planet, she indulged herself for just a second. She allowed the pictures of baby Bloom being carried on broad shoulders and held in a warm embrace soothe the ache in her arms.

Marion had had a family, too – _before_. She didn’t know where that left her.

She had had a kingdom before, as well, she suddenly realized, pulling away from Oritel. She’d managed to purge it from the witches, but as a result, she’d inadvertently turned her back on it. Her brain slipped back to a queen instead of a mother and a wife with ease, the role coming to her more naturally than breathing at the moment since her lungs were out of practice. It was the only thing that didn’t cause her pain, so she greedily focused on it.

“Excuse me”, she interrupted the conversation among the teenagers, gaining their attention instantly; it was only in hindsight she realized she’d halted a brewing argument. “I thank you all for helping my husband and me, and I can imagine that the mission wasn’t without difficulties, but I’d ask you to pause your personal conversation and focus on practicalities for a while. I know time has passed, but I had a kingdom to run before the witches attacked, and I have a duty to whatever remains of my land and people.”

“We understand, Your Majesty”, said a brown-haired girl graciously, but Marion didn’t miss the alarmed looks thrown behind her back.

“I hate having to ask”, Oritel spoke, and Marion had a feeling his thoughts had traveled along the same lines as hers since he continued, “but how many years has it been, for starters?”

The grimace spreading through the group made Marion extremely uneasy. She knew it hadn’t been the century it had felt like when she’d been trapped in metal, trying to silence the panic of her own mind and the taunts of the unholy hags surrounding her, but Bloom was proof enough that it had been significantly longer than she’d dared hope.

“I… don’t think we’re the right people to tell you”, the well-mannered fairy answered again, leaving Marion to briefly wonder whether the softness of her voice was natural or deliberate.

The pink-haired fairy stepped up with a decisive nod. “Flora’s right; we should probably head back to Alfea and to Ms. Faragonda.”

“Faragonda?”

The familiar name had stuck to Marion’s ears as well, and she’d been about to ask the girl to repeat her statement, but Oritel had beat her to it, no doubt just as eager for confirmation that their friend was all right as she was.

It was the first time since Marion’s… resurrection that she wasn’t too overwhelmed by what was happening around her to spare a thought to the circumstances under which she’d ended up in Obsidian.

They’d had a carefully crafted plan that Oritel had pored over with Griffin for several nights – a plan that Marion had nearly thrown out the window when she’d seen the destruction among her people and her planet. Her flame had burned in her chest as if it had wanted to jump out and reignite the smolders lying on the ground and falling from the sky. The only one she’d wanted to burn at that moment, however, had been her counterpart.

They’d split up, aware that the link between Marion and Valtor had been the fastest way to find him and take him down even when Marion had felt a little guilty about leaving her friends in charge of her people and army.

It had been the last time she’d seen any of them.

Not knowing what had happened had been on the long list of things that had haunted her during the time she’d spent in limbo. Just because she’d been “lucky” enough to escape death didn’t mean that all of her friends had been as well. She hadn’t dared assume one way or the other, but she had hoped they’d survived, that since she and Oritel had defeated the witches, everyone else would’ve been all right and managed to take Valtor down.

“You fought together.”

Marion’s eyes immediately shifted towards the voice that had broken the chatter caused by Oritel’s question so abruptly that a couple of the teenagers, too, turned to look at the girl who’d spoken; Marion had to once again fight back tears when she realized she hadn’t recognized her daughter’s voice.

She was about to answer Bloom, but her daughter hadn’t meant it as a question rather than a statement waiting for confirmation, which Marion gave in the form of a nod and a smile that grew genuine as she processed the true meaning of what Bloom had said. If she knew about their time at the Company, she most likely had heard about it from Faragonda – meaning they knew each other.

She hadn’t needed any more reasons to want to go see one of her dearest friends, but that realization made her charge towards the specialists’ ship, dragging Oritel after her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! I'd love to hear what you thought!
> 
> I have the next couple of chapters ready, and I'm planning on updating about once a week.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Faragonda prepares to reunite with Oritel and Marion - a miracle truly has happened. But that means they weren't dead like she thought for 17 years… And neither was Bloom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the lovely reception, I'm glad people are interested in this fic. I'm back with part two now! Get ready for the Company of Light to finally reunite. And, just for the sake of clarification, as you can see, the POV will change each part, and so will the main plotlines as the parts are pretty character-focused. And I say "part" instead of "chapter" because in my mind this is more like a collection of interconnected one-shots rather than a real chaptered story. Please ask if you feel like something's unclear! But um, without further ado, happy reading!

_The sun was shining through the tall windows of the castle, casting stray rays on the plush carpet and the row of portraits hanging on the wall. Faragonda eyed the faces she couldn’t connect to any names but that had become familiar to her during the past months, expertly sidestepping a wrinkle in the carpet edge to avoid tripping. She wouldn’t have imagined she’d start feeling at home in Marion and Oritel’s home, even if the corridors of the castle shared similarities with Alfea and she found herself missing her old school. Life hadn’t been as peaceful after graduation as she’d hoped, the Coven’s uprising casting a dark cloud on the clear sky._

_Still, she squeezed Hagen’s hand in hers, unable to stop smiling when he turned to look at her. There was no place she’d rather be at the moment than at his side. The flowers he’d clumsily tried to weave into her hair were, against odds, still adoring her braid as if they hadn’t minded the separation from their sisters when he’d plugged them from the meadow he’d taken her to for a brief moment alone in the beautiful weather._

_“We don’t have time for me to explain why I’m right – again. Haven’t I proven it enough times already that I know what I’m doing? You could believe me this time, if only for a change.”_

_The unmistakable, increasingly common sound of Oritel and Griffin arguing had Faragonda and Hagen stop in front of the library. Responding to Hagen’s huff, Faragonda let her forehead hit his upper arm both in solidarity and as a request for patience. As well as Griffin’s addition to their ranks had gone in terms of successful missions, she hadn’t yet earned the unwavering trust Faragonda had always had in her from all Company members._ ****

_Faragonda let go of Hagen and entered the room with him on her heels as subtly as one could when forced to walk through closed double doors. They were greeted with a nod from Saladin and a wry smile from Marion, but Griffin and Oritel were too busy focusing on each other to acknowledge their arrival._

_“Faragonda and I are the most sensible team for this mission. In fact, we’re the only ones who can go”, Griffin argued._

_Oritel huffed, earning himself a glare from Griffin._

_“Oppositus is high in magical energy – we won’t have much use for anyone non-magical. Marion is out of the question, and Saladin can’t go alone. So, the absolute best play is for me and Faragonda to partner up. Our powers are complementary, so we’ll appeal to the planet’s sense of harmony.”_

_“What if Valtor is working with someone? What if_ he _has a partner that gives him a boost, too?” Oritel asked._

_“He won’t have a partner.”_

_Griffin’s voice hadn’t brooked room for argument, so naturally, Oritel challenged her._

_“How can you be sure of that?”_

_“Because she’s here”, Griffin said, dropping her eyes._

_Faragonda fought a frown caused by both Griffin’s behavior and the abruptly settled silence that was broken just as Griffin’s lack of explanation was about to make everyone uncomfortable._

_“You mean Marion”, Saladin said, his tone calm and voice level._

_“Me?”_

_Griffin looked a little exasperated as she drew her focus away from the table and to Marion just as everyone else had turned to watch the woman who’d spoken._

_“Because of the Dragon Fire”, Marion continued, unprompted, the dawning realization clear on her face, “I’m his counterpart?”_

_Griffin nodded, going on to explain. Faragonda listened with one ear, more concerned about the hidden meaning behind Griffin’s insistence that Valtor wouldn’t have a partner. She’d caught what Griffin had left unsaid – Valtor wouldn’t trust anyone anymore after Griffin had betrayed him – but Faragonda wondered if Griffin had meant to imply that or if it had just been an unfortunate turn of phrase on her part. People who didn’t know or believe the depth of all the complicated feelings between Griffin and Valtor wouldn’t have thought anything of Griffin’s silence, so Faragonda assumed she was the only one who’d noticed aside from Griffin herself. Although, considering Saladin coming to her rescue, Faragonda was sure he’d noticed the implication as well._

_“As I said, Marion can’t go. Oppositus thrives on opposite energies, which means Marion needs to stay as far away from the planet as possible lest we risk Valtor becoming even more powerful”, Griffin finished, pushing pieces of hair away from her face._

_“Oritel, dear, that sounds perfectly logical to me”, Marion tried placating, curling her hand around her husband’s bicep. “Though the idea of sitting idly by does make me restless. Are you sure I can’t help, Griffin? Shouldn’t I get a boost, too?”_

_Griffin pursed her lips in thought. “Yes. But the collateral damage would be too great. Besides, we’re trying to avoid a direct confrontation. We’re not trying to stop Valtor today, just stop him from getting the scrolls.”_

_“And what if you can’t avoid a confrontation?” Hagen challenged, just as the argument had started to die down; Faragonda elbowed him carefully in the ribs._

_“It’s unlikely he’d get there before us, provided this conversation hasn’t hindered us more than I accounted for”, Griffin answered, side-eyeing Oritel. “In that case, however, I have a back-up plan.”_

_“And what is that?”_

_“Hagen”, Faragonda interrupted. “If Griffin says she has a plan, that’s enough for me. And Oritel already agreed to it, along with everyone else, right?” At several nods, Faragonda smiled, her eyes keenly on Griffin as she continued, “However, since I didn’t hear the full presentation, it wouldn’t hurt for Griffin and me to go over it once more before we leave.”_

_Griffin caught Faragonda’s gaze, agreeing as everyone else cleared out, Oritel demanding word as soon as they’d return from Oppositus._

_“I talked to you about this this morning”, Griffin said as soon as they were alone._

_Faragonda’s smirk had a sheepish quality to it as she was pleased with herself for managing to corner Griffin yet aware of the other’s discomfort over the very fact. “You did. And I know what we’re after and what to do in case we do run into Valtor. I wanted to talk to you about something else.”_

_Griffin sighed. “I figured as much.”_

_“Griffin… What will_ you _do if we are forced to fight Valtor?”_

_Griffin switched from resigned to stunned in even less time than it took for Faragonda to start regretting her unfortunate intonation. Griffin crossed her arms over her chest, trying to hide the hurt from her body even though she never managed to keep it from her eyes. “What do you mean?”_

_Faragonda reached over the table to yank one of Griffin’s hands into her own. Griffin knew she’d never imply she wouldn’t do everything within her power to stop the Coven but given Oritel’s attitude towards her just now – and Faragonda had only seen the end of that argument – Griffin was bound to be on the defense._

_“I mean that I trust your plans, so if you say we won’t encounter Valtor this time, I have faith in that. But I’m a little worried about what happens when we can’t avoid a confrontation with him.”_

_“I’ve got your back, no matter what”, Griffin said without blinking or looking at her._

_Faragonda smiled. “I know. And I have yours. But?”_

_Griffin glanced at Faragonda hesitantly, lowering her free hand on the table in order to be able to lean on it. “Why do you think there is a but?”_

_The terse words lost their punch when they were accompanied by the slightest of twitch of Griffin’s fingers inside Faragonda’s palm. “Because I know you. I know when you have a plan. And more importantly, when you don’t. You don’t have a plan for meeting Valtor.” It wasn’t an accusation, so Faragonda sincerely hoped that Griffin would recognize it as the expression of worry she’d meant it as._

_“I do”, Griffin retorted quickly. “I just…”_

_Faragonda waited patiently as Griffin sighed, worrying her lip between her teeth before continuing with barely more than a whisper, “I’m afraid we can’t stop Valtor without killing him. And I’m not sure I- I’m not sure I wouldn’t try to find another way, even if there were none.”_

_Faragonda stayed quiet for a while, trying to ignore the irony of the situation. She’d never held the lives Griffin had taken against her – not only would that have been cruel **,** but it would’ve been of no use as the ones Griffin deemed just wouldn’t have an effect on her, and the ones Griffin regretted already haunted her. Faragonda had blood on her own hands, as well, even if she rather didn’t think about it. War was very different from the combat classes at Alfea where she had always been able to try again. You had to be certain your way would work in a war for there might not be a second chance. _

_Faragonda had always admired Griffin’s tactical skills, and not just out on the battlefield. Griffin was the type to have contingency plans for her contingency plans, but she was also incredibly creative when forced to think on her feet. Faragonda was sure she could come up with a plan that an adrenaline rush would deem feasible, but there was a reason they worked out their plans when everyone had a clear head and a neutral heart._

_Griffin spoke again, unbothered by Faragonda’s lack of a response as she surely knew it was always in good faith. Her eyes shone with tears and desperation, which made Faragonda round the table to draw her in for a hug._

_“I used to trust him with my life, Fara. How do I kill him?”_

_Given all the pain Valtor already had inflicted, not to mention the destruction he’d bring down on the Magic Dimension before they would succeed in stopping him, Faragonda had no qualms about killing Valtor if needed. She wouldn’t let her sense of justice get clouded by rage, though. If there was a way to bring Valtor in peacefully, she’d do it – and not only because Griffin had just confirmed her suspicion about what killing him would mean to her. But Faragonda wouldn’t place Griffin’s feelings above the lives of everyone in the Magic Dimension – including Griffin’s own._

_Faragonda had sworn never to tell Griffin what to do when it came to Valtor. She’d told Griffin that she trusted her judgment more than Griffin herself did. The more private reason was that she didn’t understand. She believed it when Griffin told her Valtor had loved her, and Faragonda could see it herself that Griffin had loved him in return, but everything that had transpired between them had stayed between them. Neither the Coven, the Company, nor anyone else was concerned. But now Valtor’s revenge against Griffin had become one with his revenge against the world and feeling responsible for the collateral damage would kill Griffin before he’d ever get the chance._

_Faragonda squeezed Griffin tighter, her words certain. “You think about everything else that he’s threatening.”_

* * *

Although it was a call she’d made thousands of times, Faragonda’s hand trembled as she waved it over the phone she’d just hung up in order to make a new call. Nothing happened for a few seconds, so she leaned against the back of her chair and closed her eyes, allowing the shakes to take over to get them out of her system. She had been forced to fight them when she had been talking to Tecna, and while that wasn’t as necessary with Saladin as he wasn’t a student of hers, she’d rather not draw attention to herself, especially when she was perfectly fine. They had a much more important issue to discuss.

She heard rather than saw Saladin’s hologram appear on her table, indicating he’d picked up.

“Hello, Faragonda.”

“Saladin.” Her smile was so wide it was actually hurting her face, and since it was hard to keep her lips pressed together, she decided to get straight to the point, “I just spoke with Tecna and the rest of the students. They’re coming back.” She drew in a breath. “With Marion and Oritel.”

“I know, the boys just informed me.” Saladin shook his head, his voice unusually high as he asked, “Can you believe it?”

She almost couldn’t.

“Did you tell Griffin yet?” Saladin continued, not having expected an answer.

“She’ll be my next call”, Faragonda said, exchanging a few additional words about practicalities before ending the conversation and moving on to her next one.

She repeated most of her discussion with Saladin to Griffin, only with a little more detail as Griffin wasn’t as keenly up to date on the students’ mission. Faragonda had told Griffin that they had left to look for Bloom’s parents, and while back then one of her main reasons for doing that had been to gain perspective and not let Bloom’s unwavering faith get her hopes up, she now allowed herself to revel in the wonder and amazement that the seemingly impossible win had brought.

They’d succeeded. Faragonda trusted her girls and knew they were clever, powerful, and loyal to each other to a degree that was rare even among fairies. Those attributes, coupled with what she hoped was bravery and not recklessness, a disregard for rules, and some kind of destined tendency to wind up on the front lines of battles they shouldn’t even be taking part in, made them extraordinary. It had been Griffin’s offhanded comment that had had Faragonda first draw parallels to the Company of Light, and though she’d been very careful with that notion, she couldn’t deny the similarities.

Not even in her wildest dreams would she have thought the girls would reunite the original Company, however. It had been a pleasant surprise to get Hagen out of his hideout, but learning that Oritel and Marion were alive was nothing short of a miracle.

Even though it hadn’t been the reason for waking her up in the middle of the night for a long time, it still bothered Faragonda greatly that she hadn’t been present in the royal pair’s final battle against the Ancestral Witches. But the circumstances had made it impossible.

They’d followed Griffin and Oritel’s plan at first, split into teams in order to secure small areas of the kingdom that had been threatening to fall to pieces around them while they’d waited for solid intel on the location of the Ancestral Witches. They’d battled the chaos with tactic and precision to minimize the collateral damage, but although they’d been relatively successful, Faragonda had been able to tell Oritel and Hagen especially hadn’t been too pleased to be fighting in the outskirts. She’d understood Oritel’s anxiousness. The loss of lives both in his ranks and among his people, and the stress of knowing her daughters had been unaccounted for – Daphne having been in the center of their plan to locate the witches – had been enough to get the man to abandon the plan he’d agreed to when he’d had his head on straight. Faragonda could hardly blame him for that, back then or now.

It had taken her some time to admit she could hardly blame herself for what had happened after that, either.

The high of the miracle wore off quickly, and Faragonda cast her eyes out the window, left in the silence of her office with just her memories. She couldn’t stop the flashbacks from the war: the Ancestresses, Valtor, Domino. Moments she carried with her every single day but hadn’t thought about in years were now playing in her head clearer and sharper than they’d ever been during the chaos of the war and the devastating numbness that had followed it. The images kept on coming, certain moments playing multiple times and from different angles, decisions, possibilities… It was no different than back when she’d rewound the memories from the war in her head the day after they’d left Domino, frozen on the edge of her bed like the planet they hadn’t been able to save, except now she relived that day as well, her past and present spiraling together – until there was a knock on the door.

It had been Griffin, and she had ignored it at the time, but now the door was timidly pushed open, a hesitating “Miss Faragonda?” accompanied by a teenage girl with features she should have recognized and a power she had _._ There was another onslaught of memories: Princess Varanda of Calisto, Daphne nymph, the Trix, Valtor – _again_ –, Bloom earning her Enchantix when it should’ve been impossible.

Domino had been a dead planet for nearly two decades now; most of Alfea’s students had grown up in a world where that was the norm instead of a tragedy. No one was supposed to have survived the destruction, the Coven having wiped everything out in their wake. Even their defeat hadn’t brought anything back as the planet had remained just as lost as the lives of its people. Faragonda had believed Bloom to be the sole survivor. It was still hard to fathom that wasn’t the case anymore.

Faragonda wondered how Bloom was feeling at the moment, after finding the parents who had been forced to give her away. Ignoring the cautious suggestions, meant only in her best interests, about the hardships of looking for people who had been dead to the universe for nearly two decades had finally paid off.

Ecstatic even though the shock of it was yet to wear off, Faragonda hoped she hadn’t given an inaccurate impression to Bloom. She’d only ever been trying to protect her, right from the beginning. Bloom had been discovering her powers and overwhelmed enough by their world that had overnight become hers as well; not only had she not been ready to hear more and get everything she’d known to be true thrown in her face, she hadn’t had the necessary control over the flame inside her to keep her powers in check either. Faragonda had had her other students and teachers to think about as well, even when the past had hung over her and Bloom’s heads like a guillotine waiting to drop.

Bloom had been only sixteen, for Dragon’s sake.

After the Trix had spelled her origin out for her, and fake-Avalon had lured her right into Darkar’s lap by using Oritel and Marion as a bait, Faragonda had realized she’d gone about it all the wrong way.

She’d withheld some truths from Bloom so as not to give her false hope, but she hadn’t meant to completely discourage her from looking, either, not if it had been what she’d needed. Faragonda had simply tried to prepare Bloom for the kind of results she hadn’t been hoping for. But Bloom had been insistent, and being the girl’s only link to her biological parents, Faragonda hadn’t managed to keep herself from getting between them no matter how much she’d tried to stay on the background. It hadn’t felt like her place, especially after how she’d failed Oritel and Marion.

Despite her own history with the royal pair of Domino constantly lurking behind the corner, Faragonda had sworn not to let it touch their daughter. She’d been unable to keep Bloom safe from the war, so she’d decided to keep her safe from its consequences at least.

However, the betrayed look in Bloom’s eyes each time she’d come in her office to ask whether what she’d learned from varying third parties had indeed been true had hurt more than Faragonda had imagined.

She’d held on to her reasoning, managing time and again to convince herself that keeping Bloom in the dark was the right thing to do. But now, with the faith of her friends lifted from her shoulders, Faragonda was finally brave enough to ask herself if she’d done it for Bloom or for herself. She’d been sincere in trying to prevent the girl from getting hurt – but what if she’d been selfish in her ways to go about it? What if it hadn’t been that Bloom had needed to find the answers herself rather than that Faragonda hadn’t wanted to look her in the eyes and tell her how _she_ had failed? How Bloom’s parents had been heroic while she’d been sitting on the ground, trying to summon enough focus and energy despite the concussion to at least shield Hagen who’d been forced to stay with her and fight the monsters she had no longer been able to.

The flickers of guilt Faragonda had managed to avoid even through all those conversations with Bloom now anchored themselves in the pit of her stomach, making it turn.

She’d thought she’d made her peace with the war and everything that had happened. But recent events made her doubt if she had ever moved past it so much as pushed it far enough back so that she hadn’t seen it.

It wasn’t guilt over the decades-old situations she hadn’t been able to affect or choices she hadn’t actually had, either. What had settled in her subconscious the minute she’d spoken with Tecna, but until now hadn’t made itself known through anything else than a persistently growing headache, was something she hadn’t previously felt guilty about. Something that had made her proud of herself, as a matter of fact. And now it was eating away at her, crashing through the carefully crafted logic meant to keep the emotions that she hadn’t been able to deal with at the time, in check.

Oritel and Marion had been alive. Bloom had been alive. Against all odds and evidence to the contrary, they’d survived the downfall of Domino.

Most of what had happened immediately after the disappearance of the Ancestral Witches had always been a blur, but out of the cruelness of the universe perhaps, the one memory that Faragonda recalled with perfect clarity was the moment they’d realized what their victory had cost.

She remembered the ground tilting under her feet and the cold dread creeping up her body in the opposite direction of the warm blood that had been trickling from the various cuts on her skin. The silence of no one knowing how to answer the one question they all had had. The uncertainty. The denial. The despair. Hagen had been on his knees in the snow that had been gathering unnaturally quickly, Saladin limping to sit next to him, his injured leg unable to support his weight, whereas Faragonda had clung onto Griffin with the shoulder that had still been in its right place to keep herself upright and prevent herself from joining them on the ground, the ice having started to bother her without the strength to stay in her fairy form to shield herself from the elements.

She’d held on to hope at first – they hadn’t seen bodies, no one had witnessed the battle, so there had been no reason to think they had been gone more than that they’d been… somewhere. Something had gone wrong and they needed time to figure out how to get back. They would be back.

Slowly, the “would” had turned into “could”. Time had passed; she’d formed new routines in the world that had no longer been familiar. She’d tried to find a life that would have felt like hers, but it had been impossible. There had been nothing left of her life before the war, and she hadn’t been able to start building a new one for herself when she’d still been holding onto the one she had led during the war. She’d been frozen in place, unable to move in any direction.

Until one day, she’d given up. It had been simple, painless. She hadn’t wanted to share the faith of the planet that had kept haunting her dreams. As ironic as it sounded, the day she’d lost all hope had been the day she’d finally been able to think about the future. She hadn’t questioned the decision since.

Now everything was different, and doubt clouded her mind. She had stopped grasping at straws. Could she have persisted? _Should_ she have? She’d tried at first, but at one point it had started to hurt more than accepting that Marion and Oritel were gone… So, she’d given up. She could only blame the witch part in her for that, she guessed. Still, they would’ve deserved her faith. Her action _._ Instead, she’d moved on and gotten on with her life. She couldn’t regret any decisions that had led to her current life at Alfea - but what if they could’ve gotten a chance to live as well?

A sharp knock on the door (she turned to make sure she hadn’t imagined it that time around) drew Faragonda back to the present.

“Headmistress”, Griselda’s face popped out, the woman seeming abnormally wary about interrupting her, “headmaster Saladin and headmistress Griffin are here.”

Faragonda smiled, standing up. “Thank you, Griselda.”

Griselda disappeared, and Saladin and Griffin walked in. Faragonda met them in front of her desk, the strangeness of the situation highlighted as after quick greetings, the three stood in the middle of her office in a silence that wasn’t entirely awkward but far from comfortable, too. The nervousness was thick in the air, bringing comfort to Faragonda as it reminded her that she wasn’t alone with her feelings. Griffin and Saladin had been there for her through absolutely everything – they understood. It was bittersweet almost, to think that the short moment they shared in her office now, forcefully ignoring whatever dark places they’d all no doubt been in just minutes ago, would be the last of its kind.

“When are they due back?” Griffin finally asked, breaking the silence.

“According to the coordinates I received from Prince, er, King Sky, they were just nearing Magix when I left Red Fountain.”

“King?” Griffin raised an eyebrow.

Saladin shrugged. “They’re not students anymore. Time passes.”

“So it seems”, Faragonda breathed.

“And then again not”, Griffin said, her tone curious enough that Faragonda turned to look at the woman just in time to see her avoid her eyes. She exchanged a glance with Saladin but he, in turn, was in Griffin’s line of sight and hence only offered Faragonda a resigned smile.

“Shall we?” the man asked, waving the two out of the office, “They should be here any minute now.”

As they stepped in the hall, Faragonda tagged alongside Griffin, Saladin having gotten the hint and letting the two fall out of step with him.

“Are you all right to do this?” Faragonda asked, doing her best to keep her voice conversational enough so that Griffin wouldn’t immediately get her walls up.

Griffin frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I was thinking that with everything that has happened, Mandragora for example-“

“I wasn’t the one who fought her”, Griffin pointed out dryly, but Faragonda didn’t take the bait, fixing Griffin with a stern look that got her to at least stop walking.

“I just meant that as much as all of this feels like history repeating itself to me, this must bring back an even larger variety of memories for you”, she tried tactfully.

It was the second time in not-that-long that people who had been supposed to be gone after the battle of Domino had come back. They’d dealt with Valtor, but Faragonda had seen how hard the resurgence of her former lover had been for Griffin, who’d been standing in the way and in the center of his revenge. Griffin had shared the bare minimum of information about what had happened during the time she’d spent as his prisoner in her own school, to assure to Faragonda she hadn’t been hurt, but Faragonda knew she had been. Griffin had just hidden her wounds under her clothes or inside her mind. It was especially the latter that Faragonda worried about.

After decades and decades of friendship, Faragonda sadly still couldn’t navigate the zigs and clefts in Griffin’s mind, but she knew they existed and what happened when an idea got stuck in one of the dead ends of that maze. Faragonda trusted Griffin implicitly; she knew where Griffin’s loyalties lied and wanted to make sure she knew she was by her side no matter how twisted her thoughts and feelings got.

Griffin met Faragonda’s eyes briefly, her teeth pausing to bite down on her lower lip for a split-second before she answered, “It does...”

Faragonda squeezed Griffin’s hand softly, in case the woman would be more open to nonverbal support, hoping she could draw some of the guilt that never seemed to completely leave Griffin, through osmosis. Oritel had never been shy to express his opinions about Griffin’s past affiliations with the Coven, and that had been before they’d become responsible for the destruction of his family and planet. Faragonda just wanted Griffin to know where _her_ loyalties lied. Before she could open her mouth to tell her, however, Griffin continued.

“But don’t worry, I’m not planning to steal the spotlight with my problems today.”

The joke fell flat under the bittersweet smile Griffin threw with it, but Faragonda read the way her friend drew her hand back and herself to her full height, and so she didn’t press further. Griffin was right in a way; there would be plenty enough of old scars to open that day as it was.

“Speaking of Mandragora…” Griffin said as they stepped outside, catching Faragonda off guard with the speed with which she’d managed to turn the tables. Not that Faragonda was really surprised for she’d noticed Griffin’s eyes on her earlier.

“I’m fine.”

Griffin looked at her for a second, most likely trying to decide whether or not she believed her, but her stare didn’t drift down from her face to check her gait. The act of respect solidified Faragonda’s decision to let Griffin be, so she didn’t comment as Griffin nodded, adding, “Good. Then we’re both fine.”

It was a blatant lie – or a gross overstatement at least – but it was the only thing they could be dishonest about with each other, and Faragonda was equally guilty of taking advantage of that unspoken agreement between them. 

“Is that…” Griffin frowned, guiding Faragonda’s attention towards the direction of her gaze.

“Oh. Yes”, Faragonda said, realizing who Griffin had spotted – not that it was hard when Hagen was the only one standing on the big, empty yard. “I should’ve told you, but I… I didn’t know if he was comfortable with that, and then it slipped my mind.”

Griffin looked a little shocked but waved Faragonda off as the man in question rushed towards them.

“Saladin! Griffin!”

“It’s good to see you, Hagen”, Griffin greeted, not a trace of surprise lingering in the warmth of her smile; Faragonda was grateful for the tactfulness.

“It really looks like the Company assembles again”, Saladin said, and whereas Faragonda had heard similar quips from him over the years, now the words had a weight that hadn’t been there before. She shared her friend’s sense of wonder.

“I can’t believe it”, Hagen muttered, his eyes searching the clear blue sky – for the ship or something else, Faragonda couldn’t tell. She would’ve known twenty years ago, back when she would’ve clasped his hand and waited with him.

“There!”

As if Hagen had willed it into appearing, the familiar shade and shape of Red Fountain’s ship emerged from the horizon along with Saladin’s excited shout. As the ship started slowing down in preparation for landing, Faragonda took a quick look around the yard, out of habit more than anything else as there still wasn’t anyone else on sight. Faragonda was glad nearly all of the students and the majority of the teachers were still sleeping at that hour of the day, since even when she trusted her colleagues’ sense of discretion, the school was more peaceful while virtually empty. She knew how much Marion and Oritel appreciated privacy, rare as it had always been for them.

Much less now that they’d literally come back from the dead after defeating the greatest threat the Magic Dimension had seen.

Clasping her hands in front of her in order to keep herself from fidgeting from the sudden nerves, Faragonda tried to decide what the best way to approach the ship’s passengers would be. Normally, she’d concentrate on the wellbeing of her students first while giving Saladin an opportunity to do the same, and only then take care of everything else, from small administrative issues to hostile magical creatures to questions that concerned the entire the Magic Dimension.

She felt it right to follow the same pattern now, too. Barring an emergency, she’d see to her students first. She hoped there had been no injuries, but even then, the girls would certainly be tired and hungry and deserved to be able to head straight to shower and bed. She’d speak with them the next day when the information they needed to exchange would have a better chance of actually reaching point B from point A.

Marion and Oritel would probably not fare any better, but they, unfortunately, wouldn’t have the luxury of resting. They’d be exhausted, Faragonda was sure, but they would all _need_ to talk first. They’d want to talk first themselves, most likely, and for that, they’d need time. So, students first. Even when it felt rude to ignore the friends she’d spent decades praying to see again. Faragonda could only hope Oritel and Marion would understand it wasn’t a question of priorities.

Catching Saladin’s eyes, Faragonda nodded in the silent agreement that she’d lead. Shielding her face from the sand the ship sent flying as it slowly touched the ground, she briefly thought of Bloom. Faragonda couldn’t imagine what the girl was going through at the moment, so she’d give her space unless Bloom herself approached her. Bloom had never been just another student, but Faragonda hadn’t felt comfortable with special treatment in the past, so she didn’t see good enough a reason to start now.

Griffin and Hagen had stayed back, so Faragonda was comforted when Saladin walked next to her as the ship’s door opened.

“Welcome back!” Faragonda greeted, trying to keep her tone even by reminding herself those were the words she’d used many times in similar situations – that it was only the abnormality of this particular one that made them sound foolish to her ears. “Did everything go all right on your way here?”

She almost missed the chorus of murmured positives the students gave as they walked down the brow when she suddenly spotted Oritel and Marion on top of it.

The familiarity of the sight slapped her right in the face. Oritel and Marion were dressed in the battle uniforms they had had on often during the war, including during the final battle. Marion’s hair was as brilliant of a shade of red as it always had been, and Oritel’s posture was that of a young man. It was as if no time had passed and they’d just taken a slight detour on their way back from the battlefield.

Faragonda shook her head, offering her friends a smile that was but a shadow of the feelings boiling inside her before turning her attention back to what Saladin and Timmy were talking about. She forced herself to keep her eyes and thoughts fixed on her students (the former easier than the latter) while she congratulated them, making sure they were relatively unharmed. She observed the way Musa was leaning heavily into Riven and the way Flora looked dead on her feet, even when they all laughed at something Stella said. And she couldn’t help but notice Bloom keeping her distance from all groups, wrapped in Sky’s arms.

“We’ll talk tomorrow”, Faragonda said, the girls’ faces brightening at the dismissal. “Go get some rest, you’ve earned it.” She made sure to glance directly at Bloom before adding, “I’m really proud of you.”

They’d once again worked in tandem with Saladin, so the boys were ready to bid their farewells then, too. The students all cleared out of the yard in record speed, the girls kissing their respective boyfriends goodbye before the specialists boarded the ship with a subtle salute to the royal pair still standing awkwardly near the brow.

“We’re sorry to make you wait”, Faragonda said as soon as the ship had taken off and they were alone. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other while trying to decide how to proceed. Could you say “welcome back” to people you assumed dead for almost two decades?

Hagen evidently thought so, as he called out the exact words. And just like that, Oritel and Marion ran to them, letting go of each other to greet their friends. Faragonda had barely time to comprehend what was happening before Oritel had wrapped his arms around her, lifting her off the ground as he embraced her. She stifled the urge to squeal like the young girl Oritel seemed to think she still was, only fixing him with a mocking smile as he let her down and moved on to Hagen.

“I’m so glad to see you.”

Marion’s words were rushed, the end of her sentence reaching Faragonda’s ears at the same time as the beginning as Marion dove in for a hug. Her mix of desperation and delight clashed with Faragonda’s gratefulness and disbelief in a way that left both women on the edge of hysteria, clinging onto each other like their respective lives depended on it. The life just given back and the one tainted with defeat.

Faragonda felt queasy, but watching the reunion, she realized it wasn’t from joy anymore but from disgust at herself. She had fought tooth and nail for hope when she should’ve fought for her friends. It had been a selfish decision, to give up because holding on would’ve made her feel worse.

The mistrust in Oritel and Marion’s return after all the years Faragonda had spent thinking she’d lost them lingered even when so did the warmth of their embraces, providing physical support for the visual of the pair walking on the yard of Alfea. It felt bizarre, as if she’d led two lives that were now suddenly mixing together. She supposed that was accurate, more or less. They all needed to adapt to the drastic changes, once more.

It was only after Oritel cleared his throat that Faragonda took notice of the awkward silence that had settled in. She wasn’t sure she preferred conversation once she heard the words that came out of his mouth, though.

“Thank you for the warm welcome. I feel like we have a lot to discuss.” Oritel drew Marion closer to him. “Your students weren’t willing to provide much information about what has happened outside Obsidian during the past- how long has it been, exactly?”

With all eyes focused on Faragonda, the woman sighed. “I think it’s best we take this to my office. Come”, Faragonda gestured for the group to follow her as she led them along the luckily still quiet halls. It was nearing the time Faragonda knew the first students would get up and almost all members of her staff would already be up, but Griselda was the only one to greet them on the way.

Faragonda was almost certain Griselda had had her hand in keeping people away, but she’d have to thank her for that later. Aching to make sure her students were all right as much as desiring some time to talk, she asked Griselda to go check on Ofelia and the Winx.

Griselda was her tactful self, but Faragonda had known the woman long enough to notice the curious glimmer in her eyes as she followed them inside the office, agreed to the request easily, and closed the door on her way out. Faragonda could understand that; Griselda was looking at war heroes. Faragonda had never considered herself a part of that category, but now, the familiarity of the look on Griselda’s face did make her wonder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked it :)
> 
> In case you're interested in reading more about the scenario about Faragonda and Hagen right after the war, DarkPoisonousLove has written an awesome companion piece "How Many Losses Does a Victory Cost?" Go check it out!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The reunion doesn't go as smoothly as one could've hoped. Griffin was hardly hopeful, though, not with the past right behind her shoulders.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Buckle up and get ready for feels, Griffin is not having fun in this xd
> 
> There's a short part of a panic attack near the beginning of the chapter. Nothing too graphic IMO, but I'll mention it in case someone wants to skip it.

With Alfea’s eastern tower shielding Griffin’s eyes from the rising sun and Faragonda’s words about history repeating itself ringing in her ears, Griffin stood next to Hagen in the courtyard as they watched the Red Fountain ship land. Faragonda and Saladin stepped forward, but Griffin stayed put, feeling a weird sense of camaraderie towards Hagen who also hadn’t moved. They were on the fairies’ turf and using the specialists’ technology, which excluded both Griffin as the head of Cloud Tower, and the swordsmith she hadn’t seen in shy of 17 years. Not since he’d left the Fortress of Light, breaking Faragonda’s heart by abandoning her to search for Oritel and Marion and crushing her last flicker of hope by never returning.

Despite the bumps in both the beginning and the end of their friendship, Griffin was pleased to see the desolation on Hagen’s face replaced with hopefulness now that the man was so close to achieving his lifegoal by being reunited with Oritel and Marion. She didn’t resent Hagen’s uncharacteristic cheerfulness. She resented the strings of envy that were slowly but surely threading themselves into her soul for they were witnessing a miracle and she was too filled with negative emotions to feel even worthy of being around all that happiness, afraid she’d infect everyone else.

Therefore, as much as Griffin yearned for the chance to touch her long-lost friends in order to make sure the rest of them weren’t all sharing one big hallucination, she’d have to keep her distance. Distance so she wouldn’t taint the reunion from the ones who deserved it. Distance so Marion and Oritel wouldn’t need to associate with the lover of the man who destroyed their home, family, and lives. Distance so Faragonda wouldn’t need to get in between the argument that had been festering in the royal pair’s minds even longer than the cause for it had been encased in ice. Griffin would avoid triggering it at any cost.

Valtor had always been a trigger, in more ways than Griffin had thought at first. She’d realized that while curled up on the floor of her office the night he’d escaped from Omega, trying to convince herself it wasn’t his magic that was trying to choke the life out of her.

Knowing she’d meet ghosts from her past, Griffin had tried to prepare herself this time. Marion and Oritel were triggers. Even when she’d missed them, and the idea of seeing them should have filled her with joy instead of terror and regret.

She hated her triggers, having to add to the ever-growing list in her mind only after a seemingly minor and random thing suddenly had her gasping for the thinned-out air. She had enough memories in her head and her nightmares – she didn’t need the outer world adding to them.

Which was why after the war, Griffin had gone home for the holidays with a mission in mind. Of course, she’d loved to see her family and had known her mother would never have let her not come check in after everything that had happened… But the thing she’d been after had been a proper winter.

She’d layered up with enough clothes so that she would feel the cold but not actually get cold since half of her point had been not to activate an inch of her magic.

Then, one night, when her childhood bed had been too small for the terrors in her mind, she’d snuck out to the snow. She’d stood there till the fog formed out of her breathing had no longer been irregular and uneven, till the snowflakes hitting her cheeks hadn’t made her flinch from the memories of Belladonna’s icicles piercing her skin, till the slippery ice under her feet hadn’t made her think back to the last day of Domino when she’d wished it had been just the frosted ground that had made her feel unbalanced.

And then she’d done it again the next night, and the next, until one time she had been tired and comfortable enough to fall asleep on the garden bench. She’d woken up to her mother shaking her with even more force than her muscles that had been trying to warm her up.

Her mother hadn’t said anything, for which Griffin had been grateful, since the pure heartbreak in her eyes had been painful enough to get Griffin to bow her head while she slipped into her room, feeling young enough for it to be age-appropriate. But even when she’d woken up the next morning to a sore throat, and the hidden anger behind her mother’s tight-pressed lips as she’d developed a fever towards the evening, she’d been too relieved to be free to be bothered about those.

How stupid she’d been.

As if any of them would ever be free from the war’s consequences. Oritel and Marion’s freedom from Obsidian was as superficial as the sense of calm Griffin had slowly begun finding during the 17 years they’d been gone.

Griffin pressed her fingers to her palms to give her brain something to focus on aside from the crippling fear caused by the realization she couldn’t draw in a breath. She felt chills running down her neck and spine and quickly spreading along her ribs, the cold knocking the air out of her lungs. Just like Belladonna. Just like Domino.

Griffin shifted her eyes around the yard, trying desperately to find something that would help the rational part of her mind gain control over her body again. The crunch under her feet was from sand, not snow. The wind was warm and dry and devoid of ice. The laughter surrounding the group of students Faragonda and Saladin were speaking to was clear and soft, nothing like the shrill cackling of the Ancestral Witches.

Slowly, Griffin could feel the panic release its grip on her. Once free, she shoved it back with all the force she could muster. They had lost Marion and Oritel, but not the war. And, fixing her gaze to the pair in question, it seemed that some lost things could be recovered.

Marion and Oritel still stood where they’d stepped off the ship, Oritel carrying his sword in one hand and Marion’s hand in the other. They were both dressed in the battle armor that had become the norm during the last few months of the war. But there was a difference to the pair, the darkness of Obsidian lingering on them both figuratively and literally. Griffin could feel the magic, though she couldn’t tell if the pull she felt was due to the strength of the magic or because her own was on high alert after all the emotions she was caught in between. Seeing Marion and Oritel was just like it had been to see Valtor again, only nothing like it.

If Griffin hadn’t been running her hands over her body regularly ever since she’d left the Coven to make sure she didn’t bear Valtor’s mark on her skin as well as in her soul, she could’ve sworn he’d branded her. It didn’t make sense otherwise, how irrevocably he was etched into her mind. But that was precisely her problem – he hadn’t used a spell to make her his. He’d marked her with his love, and no amount of time, hate, or regret could wash that off.

Griffin kept looking back and forth between Faragonda and Saladin, and Marion and Oritel, even though her focus was anywhere but on the conversation taking place. It seemed Marion and Oritel were as oblivious as Griffin was, though. They had their eyes locked on Bloom who’d separated herself from her friends.

Griffin’s stomach turned. Marion and Oritel had returned from the dead, more or less, but even that couldn’t turn back time and give them back what they’d unfairly lost in the battle of Domino. She didn’t know which had been harder to reconcile with, believing that Bloom had died in the war or it having taken 16 years to learn that she hadn’t. The worst of it was that to that day, Griffin hadn’t been able to get Faragonda to stop blaming herself. To stop _herself_ from blaming herself, Griffin hadn’t even bothered trying.

How could she not feel responsible when even the sight in front of her only made her ashamed of the things her heart was whispering instead of trying to deny them? It would be of no use as she would just be lying.

The guilt was eating away at her so badly that she wished that, as the students cleared out, she too could turn on her heel and retreat back to Cloud Tower. She’d willingly take Ediltrude and Zarathustra’s questions about her untimely return over standing at the end of their makeshift row, waiting for the awkwardness that would ensue on her turn. She’d never forgive herself if she fled now, though, in fear of her absence being even more offensive than her presence.

Hugs and handshakes were filling the courtyard, all initiated by Oritel or Marion; apparently, they had all come to the same conclusion of giving the pair space. Oritel and Marion didn’t seem to have any desire for that, however. Griffin had to drop her eyes after the sight of Oritel lifting Faragonda off the ground, the pure joy exuding from both of them too overwhelming.

“Griffin?”

Marion’s voice, instantly familiar even when Griffin had already grown accustomed to the thought of never hearing it again, broke through the buzz in Griffin’s mind. Marion approached her carefully, her frown quickly masked by a smile when Griffin looked up at her.

“Marion”, Griffin said, the woman’s name a replacement for a greeting since she didn’t know what to say. All the pleasantries in the world would run out too soon.

Luckily, Marion shared Griffin’s dislike of empty words. Her touch shocked Griffin with its warmth as she drew Griffin in for a hug without warning. It should’ve been comforting as the tightness with which Marion squeezed her silenced the doubt in Griffin’s mind that kept saying she didn’t deserve to have their deaths off her conscience – she couldn’t imagine a world where her anything would be a higher priority than happiness for someone like Marion – but instead of bringing her relief, Marion’s gentle nature only made Griffin feel worse.

Intuitive as ever, Marion let go before Griffin felt the need to push her away. There was a light behind Marion’s eyes that Griffin couldn’t decipher before it was replaced with a brighter gleam at Oritel’s arrival to Marion’s side. Oritel paused for a second before acknowledging Griffin with a nod, the smile on his face not having faltered at any point. To Griffin’s relief and according to her expectation, he made no move towards her but wrapped an arm around his wife instead while Griffin managed a smile in return.

Even though it made the darkest corner of her heart sink, Griffin watched contently as Oritel and Marion gravitated towards each other during the walk to Faragonda’s office, squeezed each other’s hands for comfort when they shared the important details of their confinement, and supported one another as they tried to process everything they’d missed out on during that time.

Griffin barely suffocated the hysterical laughter when the royal pair turned to subtly look at her at the first mention of Valtor’s name. She ached to move closer to Faragonda who’d taken it to herself to be the bearer of bad news, for she knew that as hard as hearing about the downfall of Domino had to be for Marion and Oritel, reliving it had to be worse. Griffin couldn’t blame Faragonda for skipping over large portions of the aftermath, including Hagen leaving and the arguments with the Council, though Griffin wondered if she did so in order to spare time, keep Marion and Oritel from becoming overwhelmed, or because she felt those weren’t her stories to tell.

The elephant in the room was yet to be addressed, though. Marion and Oritel had seen Bloom, so whatever they’d thought had happened, at least they now knew their daughter was alive. But with practicalities out of the way, their true interest was obvious in the way they both perked up when Faragonda started explaining how they’d been freed from the depths of Obsidian.

“I, um, I don’t think any of us really know what happened in Obsidian”, Faragonda said, eyeing the room. “Saladin? My girls were exhausted, I’ll talk details with them later.”

Saladin shook his head. “I didn’t hear about it, either. And the students have more than earned their rest, given what they accomplished today.”

Marion answered to Saladin’s smile. “We can’t possibly thank them enough. But I have to wonder how ever they found us. You said there were no traces left on the battlefield about what had happened.”

“That’s right”, Faragonda answered. She glanced at Hagen briefly. “We tried everything but couldn’t find anything. However, your daughters were luckily more successful. You have them to thank for, especially Bloom. It was her insistence that paid off, despite everyone and everything that kept discouraging her.”

Griffin had her eyes on Marion and Oritel, trying to send some sympathy via telepathy, but she had still caught the fraction of a second during which Faragonda’s tone had betrayed her. Griffin’s heart, already in a twist due to her own mess and cracked due to the pain she could see on Marion’s and Oritel’s faces, now ached on Faragonda’s behalf, too. It was no doubt hard being the one who was gone, but she knew firsthand how hard it was being the one left behind.

“What do you mean?” Oritel asked.

Griffin inhaled sharply, but Faragonda seemed resigned rather than anxious as she drew a deep breath, glancing at Griffin and Saladin so casually the others couldn’t have read anything of it. But to Griffin, it was a clear sign – both a warning and a pursuit of support. Bloom was a touchy subject for all of them, so the conversation was doomed. That didn’t dissuade Faragonda, however, as she plunged right into the open wound.

Faragonda began with telling what they’d thought had happened after Domino’s downfall, but she switched quickly to speaking about what had happened after they’d found out that Bloom had been alive after all – or more accurately, when they’d come across a girl who’d shared several similarities with Marion and Oritel without knowing about it. A perfectly ordinary girl who’d arrived at Alfea unaware of her origins and desperate for information once she’d discovered she hadn’t been a typical non-magical resident of Earth from a normal family like she’d thought.

Griffin turned her head away as Faragonda gingerly shared the key points of Bloom discovering her biological family’s existence. Faragonda kept praising Daphne’s role and downplaying her own. She left plenty of things unsaid; Griffin filled the plot holes with the culpability she felt over those events. Still, she couldn’t help but marvel at how carefully Faragonda managed to place her words so that she mostly glossed over the Trix, Darkar, and Valtor. It was good, as Oritel and Marion didn’t need to be burdened with recent attempts at world domination, not now when they were just rehashing the aftermath of the one that had cost them both their daughters.

“Bloom has always been so determinate to find you”, Faragonda summed up, having reached the point where Bloom had found the Book of Faith, “The circumstances under which she first learned the truth about you were unfortunate, but she has such a strong will that even without our help I’m sure she’d-“

“How dare you?”

Marion had interrupted Faragonda, which was in itself a little uncommon, but what startled Griffin were the pricks in the woman’s usually soft-spoken voice. Griffin spared a quick glance at Faragonda who was blinking rapidly, her face a mix of confusion and vulnerability as she looked at her friend. Griffin swallowed dryly, turning her attention back to Marion whose complexion had now a tint resembling the color of her hair.

“How dare you?” Marion repeated, standing up, “Try to keep the truth from Bloom. Deceive her about her origin, about her powers, about her _family_.”

Faragonda spread out her hands, calm despite clearly taken aback by the sudden outburst. “I only tried to do what was best for her."

Griffin frowned as she realized Faragonda was looking Marion in the eye instead of peeking around for help. She must have worried that it would’ve suggested the others had something to do with keeping Bloom in the dark. Griffin bit her teeth together in anguish. Faragonda accepted all the blame even though she deserved none of it. She had made the decision by herself, but Griffin and Saladin had later agreed that it had been the right call. Griffin remembered all the times Marion had struck up a conversation with her during the war, once jokingly explaining that Griffin had been the only one who she could share her worst-case scenarios with and still feel as though she was the positive one. They’d talked about their fears and worries at length, and though somehow what had happened had been worse than anything they’d imagined, Griffin was still certain Marion would’ve agreed to their plan for Bloom back then.

The present-day Marion, however, had turned derisive as she continued, “Based on the weeks you’d known her? You had as little right to decide what was best for her as the next person. You don’t know her; you weren’t there for her! Why weren't you there for her?”

She spat out the last words in a rush, tears evident in her voice and behind her flaming eyes. Every word seemed to hit Faragonda all the same as she deflated, dropping her gaze to the desk. Before she could open her mouth to respond, however, Oritel stepped up.

“Why weren’t _you_ there for her?”

As Faragonda lifted her head, her brow furrowed just slightly, Griffin’s gaze shot out to Oritel. It was extremely rare for the Dominian couple to disagree with each other openly. Griffin had only seen them argue a few times.

Marion turned to Oritel then as well, seemingly having needed a second to realize he had been talking to her. She met her husband’s eyes, gasping. The hurt was written so clearly on her face it made Griffin wince.

“What?”

“Why are you blaming Faragonda when you weren’t there for our daughter, Marion?” Oritel repeated, enunciating excessively clearly. The condescending tone made Griffin want to grind her teeth, but Marion looked like she was rather about to start crying than arguing. Looks could be deceiving, though; Griffin knew Marion could easily match her husband’s temper if she was pushed enough.

“I, I-“, Marion paused to swallow, giving Oritel an opportunity to continue raining down on her.

“Where were you, Marion? Why weren’t you with Bloom? Why weren’t you there for her? Why weren’t you there?”

“Because I was with you!” Marion screamed.

“ _Why?_ I didn’t ask you to! You shouldn’t have done that!”

Griffin snuck a glance at Faragonda who looked like she wanted to break up the argument. Saladin had apparently reached the same conclusion as Griffin as he carefully moved within arm’s length of Faragonda. Hagen stood in his corner like he wanted to melt into the wall behind him.

Marion’s tone was heated as she continued, “First of all, you don’t get to tell me what I should or shouldn’t do. That was _my_ decision!”

Oritel scoffed. “Well, it was wrong! You could’ve been out here, looking for Bloom instead of being trapped in that hell like I was. I didn’t have a choice! But you did!”

Griffin would’ve guessed that the fight they were all now involuntarily witnessing wasn’t just about Oritel being mad at Marion for getting herself sucked into the Obsidian, and the hurt that had laced Oritel’s voice confirmed it. Griffin shivered at the idea of Obsidian – trying very, very hard not to think about a certain wizard who had also spent time there. Oritel most likely felt guilty for being the reason his wife had chosen to subject herself to that, judging by the fact that Marion was the only one who could go against Oritel’s wishes and still have the man’s sympathy instead of anger.

“Don’t you think I know that?” Marion cried. “Do you honestly think that I haven’t regretted not fighting for Bloom harder from the second I found out she was alive? I hate myself for not doubting Belladonna, I hate myself for believing that our daughters were dead without proof. But I thought they were! And so did you. Our daughters were dead, our planet was falling to pieces around us, Dragon only knew what had happened to our friends! And then you got sucked into Obsidian.”

Griffin held her breath along with Oritel and the rest of the room, knowing what Marion was about to say next.

“I’d already lost everything else. I couldn’t lose you, too. _Couldn’t_.” Marion shook her head. A couple of rogue tears rolled down her cheeks, but she was in control of the pitch of her voice again when she continued, ”The choice was either to go with you and share the fate of my family and people, or to stay behind and face their fate all on my own. I was terrified, and I didn’t have but a second to think. It was a decision based on desperation and panic, not logic.”

Oritel had turned his head away, but as Marion reached for his hands, he looked at her again. “What would you have done in my stead?” she asked, her tone soft; she wasn’t angry anymore, having argued her side of the story and Oritel clearly having heard her.

“I couldn’t have lost you”, he said – simply, resignedly, sullenly – before gathering her into his arms. Griffin couldn’t hear the words they exchanged while they had their faces pressed against each other’s necks, and she averted her eyes, the moment too intimate to intrude upon even out of revenge for getting subjected to the previous fight.

After a while, Hagen cleared his throat, causing the couple to jump apart and apparently, remember they weren’t alone in the room. Saladin’s face couldn’t have been any redder, Hagen was studying his shoes, and Faragonda was discreetly wiping the corners of her eyes while looking out the window. Griffin sort of regretted not having thought to teleport all of them out of the office.

“Oh, I apologize for that”, Marion said, mostly back to her royal bearings as she swept invisible dust from the waist of her dress.

“No need”, Faragonda rushed to answer, side-eyeing Griffin like she was afraid she’d say something inappropriate; the thought humored Griffin. “I am so sorry for everything you have been through. And you were right earlier, about Bloom. I’m sorry for overstepping.”

Shock crossed Marion’s face. “No, no, I’m the one who was out of line.”

Faragonda waved her hand. “It’s all right.”

“It’s not”, Griffin said.

Marion turned to look at her, a little softer than Oritel who, in turn, was staring at her warningly. Oddly comforted by the familiar show of a united front once more, Griffin returned the sharp look but made sure to keep the coldness from her voice as she continued, “We understand and forgive you, but it’s not okay. We looked. We tried. We exhausted every resort, looked through countless of spellbooks, spent countless nights in the library, looking for something – anything – that could’ve helped us find your daughters, or at least find out what had happened to them.”

Griffin paused, reminding herself not to get caught up on her own trauma as she finished quietly, “We failed, but we couldn’t have done anything more.”

She turned to look pointedly at Faragonda, her message clear. They’d all been invested, but Faragonda had taken it the hardest, nearly killing herself with work and guilt. Griffin knew that while she had laid awake in her bed, trying – in vain – to find enough comfort in the darkness surrounding her to fall asleep, Faragonda hadn’t even bothered trying, rather poring over spellbooks by the flickering light of the candelabra in the library. Embracing the irony of the situation, Griffin had taken it in her to be twice as persistent in getting Faragonda to stop as the fairy herself had always been when the roles had been reversed. 

Griffin’s words had been aimed at Marion a little, too. She didn’t necessarily agree with her friend’s decision – though listening to Marion explain it to Oritel, Griffin sympathized with her – but the truth was, if Marion had stayed, she would’ve just been one more person for Griffin to look after at a time when she hadn’t even been able to take care of herself. One more person in that circle of self-loathing and regret that had taken some decidedly unhealthy coping mechanisms and everything in her to break, and Saladin’s help to pull Faragonda out of. Griffin wasn’t sure if even the three (Four? She had no idea what Hagen would’ve done if Marion had been there; he might have stood by her, or his grief over Oritel would’ve pushed them both pass the point of no return) of them would’ve been able to pull Marion out of that cycle.

In that regard, Griffin owned everything to Saladin. She hadn’t known how he’d still been breathing even after all his injuries when she’d felt like every exhale might have pushed the tears from behind her eyes, and every inhale had felt like something inside her lungs had been trying to stab its way out. She’d known Saladin had been looking out for Faragonda, too, as much as he’d been able to, and Griffin had been grateful for him for that, too, since she hadn’t been able to be there for her– not entirely convinced if she’d even been “there”.

 _It was the silence that scared her most after the war. Before that, she’d spent so long in the throes of passion and love, then guilt and hate. Her life had been on fire from the moment she’d met Valtor. And although the world was most certainly on fire after the war, Griffin just felt… empty. She shut down, her mind locked into the past as her body was reduced into a biological entity._

_Nothing made sense. They’d lost Marion and Oritel, Hagen left two weeks after, and Griffin couldn’t bear to look at her best friend. Up was down and insomnia turned nights into days as she stumbled through the new life she didn’t recognize and wasn’t sure if she deserved._

_She’d never expected Marion and Oritel to die. She knew death; she’d seen enough of it, brought upon enough of it, not to have had any silly ideas about what happened during a war. She’d known there would be losses. But out of all of them, the Coven had managed to vanquish Oritel and Marion. It was absurd. Griffin had counted the odds of the king and queen – equally valiant, intelligent. and powerful – losing about the same as herself surviving. They had been her friends, which made it even worse._

_She shouldn’t have made it out of Domino alive._

_She knew the war hadn’t been her fault; the Coven had been hell-bent on destroying everything in their wanton quest for power. The battle on Domino had been the boiling point of a chain reaction that had been set in motion long before most of those who’d taken part in it had been born. There would’ve been no preventing the conflict – Griffin wasn’t sure if they could even claim to have stopped it._

_But she was painfully aware of the fact that she’d played a part on both sides. Neither of which had won._

_Griffin hardly dared think about Marion and Oritel with the lump in her chest that had Valtor’s name on it. She swore never to speak his name out loud again. He’d disgraced the sacrifice the royal pair had made, tainted her mourning for them, and made it so that Griffin was forced to avoid Faragonda, knowing that the fairy’s grief would be the thing to pull her under since she was already drowning in guilt._

_Drowning was a silent way to die, she thought, scared of her own inability to connect with the remains of their world and her friends._

_Of course, the protecting numbness gave way before long, and then it was only natural that it was Saladin who found her, curled up under the night sky. The pain made her breath hitch, and the tears that she’d kept inside her in hopes that she could’ve used them to stick the pieces of her heart back together burned her skin as they rolled down her cheeks. Saladin didn’t say anything as he sat down next to her, offering her everything he could in his silence that for once gave her room to breathe instead of trying to suffocate her._

“You did all that?” Marion asked, her voice fragile like glass but strong enough to yank Griffin back into the present.

Griffin hastily flitted her gaze away from Faragonda’s questioning look and to the woman who’d spoken, nodding in confirmation.

Oritel squeezed Marion’s shoulder, his head bowed towards her, before he looked up, carefully finding all of his friends’ eyes. “I’m sorry, we should’ve known. We appreciate it.”

Griffin nodded again in acknowledgment of the rare apology, offering the pair a faint smile as she let her breathing normalize.

“It was nothing”, Faragonda said. “And about Bloom, I feel like I owe you an explanation at least. I knew Daphne had managed to be in contact with Bloom, but she hadn’t told her she’s her sister. And since Bloom was… um, still unaware that she was adopted, I felt it wasn’t my place to tell her anything.”

“She knows, now, obviously”, she added hastily. “And… you should know that even though it’s so _unfair_ you didn’t get to be there, Bloom grew up loved and cherished.”

“We understand. And…” Oritel paused, sharing a look with Marion, “if you have a way of contacting the people who took Bloom in, we’d love a chance to thank them in person.”

Faragonda smiled. “Of course.”

* * *

 _“My girls are all sleeping in the hall, and Ofelia cleared the ones who’ve been injured for teleporting. So, we’re good to leave in the morning.”_

_Faragonda smiled at Griffin, who closed the office door, resisting the temptation to support too much of her weight on it for then she’d never find the strength to cross the distance to the chair Faragonda was waving for her to take._

_“That’s good news”, Faragonda said as Griffin sat down._

_Griffin couldn’t help agreeing. She was eternally grateful there had been no lives lost – it felt like more benevolence than the circumstances should’ve granted them._

_“Your students did well”, she said, acknowledging the fairies’ part in their success._

_“Yours too. We’re stronger together.”_

_Griffin huffed a laugh that maybe sounded contemptuous, but she knew her face showed she was only teasing when she said, “Don’t count on my girls jumping onto the chance to work with fairies again any time soon.”_

_Faragonda rolled her eyes. “Well, we’re grateful for the help, anyway.”_

_Griffin let her voice drop. “As are we.”_

_Alfea had welcomed them in with open arms just as Faragonda had done to her after all the years they’d spent apart, only a common enemy – which had been all Griffin’s fault, no less – managing to shake them enough to see the level of hostility that the rivalry between their schools had reached while their headmasters had nursed their private resentments. The Trix had been her responsibility, and although Griffin knew that in the end, everyone involved had made their own decisions, she couldn’t help seeing the drastic difference between the three of her seniors who’d been close to destroying the Magic Dimension, and the five of Faragonda’s first years who’d insisted on being on the first line of defense against them. Griffin had not only failed Icy, Darcy, and Stormy but all her other students as well, putting them in harm’s way along with everyone else in Magix._

_Faragonda had tried to convince her that just because she’d been wrong about the Trix didn’t mean she’d been wrong about giving them a chance, but Griffin had trouble reconciling with the gracious thought in the current situation. She glanced out the window with the bitter knowledge it wasn’t the darkness of the night that kept her from seeing Alfea’s eastern tower._

_As if sensing the direction of her thoughts – or merely catching the direction of her eyes, Faragonda sighed. “It’ll take time before life gets back to normal.”_

_Griffin hummed, turning to look at Faragonda again, but the fairy was already finding the bright side in everything, as per usual, and continuing, “But we have a reason to be thankful; we both know how much worse it could’ve been.”_

_Though the words were optimistic enough, the point of comparison was evident in Faragonda’s tone. The years that had gone by had numbed Griffin enough that she could keep herself from flinching visibly, but she couldn’t prevent her lungs from sticking to the inside of her ribcage, trapping in the air she couldn’t even use up as it was weighing her down._

_“It’s a miracle Bloom managed to defeat Icy”, Griffin said quietly. ~~~~_

_“In the current circumstances, she was the only one who could have.”_

_Griffin nodded. “Fire needs to be fought with fire.”_

_Faragonda looked at her, her choice of words no doubt not having gone without notice. “Griffin-“_

_“She’s really Marion and Oritel’s daughter?”_

_Griffin knew it, could feel the Dragon Fire in the core of her being – her magic didn’t care about the improbability of it that her head was arguing for, nor the pain that her heart was doing everything in its power to prevent her from feeling and thus denouncing the idea completely. She knew Bloom was the baby that had brought fragile hope to the bleakest of times **,** the baby that had been the embodiment of everything they’d been fighting for, the baby Griffin had held in her arms and sworn to protect with her life. The baby they’d thought had died along with her family and planet. _

_Faragonda looked as if she’d stopped breathing when she answered, ”Yes.”_

_The confirmation was as thrilling as it was devastating. Griffin swallowed thickly. “How?”_

_“Daphne.”_

_Of course. Daphne had been one of the most powerful fairies Griffin had heard of in her life; she should’ve known the young woman would’ve found a way to protect her little sister. Marion wouldn’t have entrusted Bloom to her lightly._

_Griffin could hardly stop the bile from rising to her mouth. She had barely been able to fathom how Marion and Oritel had grown to trust her with their younger daughter. A fat lot of good that trust had been to them. It had been her plan that they’d followed and that had led to Daphne’s demise and Bloom’s separation. She should’ve been able to protect them like she’d pledged to do._

_Griffin wrapped her thoughts into a sentiment Faragonda couldn’t deny. “I can’t believe Bloom’s alive.”_

_It was a miracle, although no thanks to her incompetence._

_“I know.” Faragonda stayed quiet for a while before speaking again. “Do you think we could’ve-“_

_“Fara.”_

_Griffin wasn’t sure how to continue her thought, but she had needed Faragonda to stop before she finished the what-if that would’ve destroyed them both. It was terrible enough to have to go through the regrets that had gotten buried underneath the heartbreak for years – Griffin couldn’t bear Faragonda’s pain on top of that when it was unwarranted. Faragonda had nothing to feel guilty over, and she deserved this second chance as much as Bloom had. But how could Griffin convey the forgiveness she couldn’t grant to herself? How would she justify the scenario in which she was to blame and Faragonda wasn’t for a decision they’d made together? Faragonda wouldn’t accept empty words, and Griffin couldn’t answer to Faragonda’s arguments with a clear conscience. So, she let the sentence die._

_Faragonda had interpreted her interruption wrong. “I’m sorry.”_

_“Don’t”, Griffin rushed to reassure while trying not to choke on her selfishness. She’d rather collapse under the weight of the past than let Faragonda think she needed to carry hers as well. Faragonda had done that too many times already, getting burned in Griffin’s behalf for things that should never have hurt her._

_They sat in silence, the resurfaced memories making both too ill at ease to converse about the topic they surely would’ve needed to talk about. Griffin had avoided mentioning Bloom for she knew Faragonda had taken the loss even more personally than the loss of Oritel and Marion. And since Griffin’s own past – that no matter how she wished, refused to stay there – made the names of Oritel and Marion burn on her tongue, trying to comfort Faragonda over what had happened had felt like pouring salt into wounds that she herself had cut. So, Griffin had resolved to wait for Faragonda to approach the topic, which the latter never had. Griffin could only hope that the blessing they’d received would help Faragonda find some peace. Maybe it would help restore Griffin’s belief in the universe, too._

_“Does Bloom know that you’re her…“_

_“No.”_

_Griffin studied the creases around Faragonda’s eyes that should’ve been from smiling, and the lines near the corners of her mouth that should’ve been her dimples. The apparent self-loathing made her stomach drop._

_“You should tell her”, Griffin said softly. “She should have someone. And you’ve been nothing but an exemplary fairy godmother all these years; trust me on that, Fara.”_

_Faragonda turned her gaze to her lap, but Griffin was relieved to see the hints of a smile on her face as she played with her hands._

_“Are you sure you won’t stay for the party later?” Faragonda asked. “Saladin and his students are.”_

_The repeated invitation and the underlying suggestion warmed Griffin’s heart, but she shook her head. Witches didn’t do those kinds of parties, nor did they recover from tragedies quickly. Griffin wasn’t about to let her students into a situation where they would be tempted to seek oblivion from drinking or in the arms of someone who wouldn’t give them a second thought the following morning. The more cautious ones, for their part, would escape the joyous celebration they’d feel guilty for being unable to take part in, to the unhealthy thoughts inside their head. She knew from personal experience where those coping mechanisms could lead to, and most of her students didn’t have someone like Faragonda to look after them._

_“No, thank you. Cloud Tower is waiting for us.”_

_Cloud Tower would need them as much as they’d need it to recover from the Trix’s attacks. In addition to her school, Griffin had her students and colleagues to take care of. None of them had seen war before, so in order to help them get through their traumas, Griffin would need to revive the right parts of her own. She hoped Faragonda would be able to do the same, for she had her people to support as well, not to mention Bloom who’d already escaped war once before only for it to catch up with her 16 years later._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked this part as well! I sadly couldn't include all the dialogue since otherwise this would have become an epic when I only set out to write a novella ;) Don't hesitate to ask if something was left unclear!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even queens can only shoulder so much heartbreak. After some shocking news, Marion reaches her limit. (Luckily, Oritel is there.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't be fooled by the uplifting end of the summary; I'm doing my best to make you cry with this chapter. Also, I’ve taken some artistic liberties with the Dragon Fire lore.

Out of every feeling Marion had kept shoving deeper inside her to be processed later like she’d been taught to do, shame wasn’t the one she would’ve imagined to be the most stubborn and resilient, refusing to be kept down even after it had been rendered unnecessary by apologies offered and accepted.

The burn was nearly pleasant against the coldness of the truths she’d been forced to take in, though.

It was still hard wrapping her head around it all, let alone her heart. It had been 17 years since the battle on Domino. 17 years during which she’d been dead in every tangible way, except for the one that would’ve finalized her fate. 17 years during which her husband had tried, in vain, to reach her, her friends had had to learn how to navigate through their losses, and her youngest daughter had grown up blissfully unaware of the hardships of the first moments of her life.

Considering the circumstances, Marion couldn’t help but think that had been for the best. Bloom had been protected and treasured, and the blame for it not being done by Oritel and her wasn’t on anyone but the Ancestral Witches. Least of all on the people who’d opened their home and hearts to a tiny baby with nothing left but the love of the ghosts of her family.

While Marion could reconcile with Bloom’s life now that she’d heard her worst nightmares hadn’t come true, she felt her heart bleed at the thought of Daphne. Daphne had explained, with muted words and downcast eyes, about the curse that the witches had placed on Sirenix and that had reduced her to her current form at the edge of life. Even in the comfort of Alfea, Marion shuddered from the memories of Obsidian. She would’ve gladly spent another 17 years in limbo before ever subjecting Daphne to such horror that had made her able to relate to her mother’s suffering.

Turning once again to her friends for information since both her daughters were still out of reach for her at the moment, Marion kept her voice gentle to make up for her outburst earlier as she asked about Daphne.

“Saladin and I tried to contact Daphne once”, Faragonda said, having explained how they’d started suspecting Daphne hadn’t been dead after all given the legends people had been telling. “After we learned she might reside in Lake Roccaluce.”

“You did?”

Marion turned to subtly look at Griffin. Griffin’s tone had been less controlled than usual, and now she stared at Faragonda, eyebrows raised in shock. “You never said anything”, she added, more calmly, as if trying to excuse her reaction.

Faragonda drew a quick breath. “You and I weren’t speaking then”, she said simply, but her voice was haunted with a mix of regret and sadness, which didn’t escape Marion’s notion.

Marion observed keenly as understanding flashed in Griffin’s eyes, frowning as the woman pressed her lips together with the most delicate nod. Griffin’s reaction, coupled with Faragonda’s odd choice of words, made Marion worry about how severe the conflict had been. Faragonda’s statement didn’t seem like something one would say if the falling out had only lasted for a reasonable amount of time. Marion couldn’t imagine what could have been atrocious enough to have caused the two to drift apart.

“We were hoping she’d know…” Saladin looked at Faragonda with a resigned smile, a question in his eyes. The latter shrugged, and Saladin continued, “Well, anything really.”

“But we were unsuccessful.”

Saladin nodded at Faragonda. “Daphne was… too weak for a conversation. We didn’t even learn what had happened to her to transform her into her current form of a spirit.”

Saladin spoke calmly, but his reluctance to spread the hurt that was already urging Marion to shut her ears was evident in his eyes. Instead, Marion bit her teeth together to keep the pain from spilling out – maybe it would quench the rage she could feel building up inside her since they now knew who were to blame for Daphne’s suffering.

“We were afraid Daphne wouldn’t be able to communicate at all”, Faragonda said, “until Bloom proved us wrong.”

As Faragonda explained how Daphne had started appearing to Bloom in her dreams, helping and comforting her in times of need, Marion recognized the feeling she’d become very familiar with already back when Daphne had been but a small child. Her firstborn had always had the weight of the world on her shoulders as if the crown and the etiquette and everything else that came with being first in line for the throne weren’t enough. Over the years, Marion had given up on wondering how she could simultaneously be so proud of Daphne for carrying it all while wishing she were able to ease that burden even a little. But the paradoxical bittersweet feeling once again filled her aching heart as Faragonda praised Daphne’s love for and dedication to her little sister. Not least because Marion couldn’t stop thinking it shouldn’t have been Daphne’s job to take care of Bloom but her parents’.

“Daphne and Bloom used some kind of psycho-magic messaging that their linked connection to the Dragon Fire enabled, but we were relieved to learn that she could eventually communicate face to face, too. That’s how Daphne and I came to an agreement that-“

“I’m sorry, hold on”, Marion said, holding up her hand to interrupt, “I’m not following. Bloom has the Dragon Fire? How…”

Faragonda’s expression should’ve sent alarms off in her head, but Marion was too preoccupied with trying to think of a reason why the Great Dragon would’ve suddenly decided to grace her family with two sets of her powers, let alone how she could’ve _missed_ Bloom having the same flame that burned inside her.

She’d been concerned when she’d first felt her magic acting up when she’d been pregnant with Daphne. She’d grown used to it eventually, to the point where she had again had the perfect control over her Dragon Fire, but Daphne’s magic had been like an echo inside her body as it had been the same but still its own entity. With Bloom, however, Marion had been able to feel her daughter’s magic, but she hadn’t thought it from the Dragon. The pregnancy had been different from Daphne’s – both in good and bad ways – but she had been quite certain Bloom would have some other type of magic. Even when she hadn’t been able to tell what that would be exactly. Apparently, her instincts had been wrong.

Saladin disrupted that train of thought quickly. “It’s our understanding that Daphne abdicated her position as the guardian, sending the Dragon Fire to safety with Bloom when the Coven attacked.”

“What?”

Oritel’s shock barely registered in Marion’s hazy mind as she stared at Saladin, forgetting to blink.

“Daph- Daphne _gave_ her Dragon Fire to Bloom?” Marion repeated, having a hard time comprehending what she’d just heard. “She gave away her birthright?”

Oritel had a pained look on his face as he turned to her, but she couldn’t tell if it was from worry over their daughter or her as she sunk her nails into his arm to keep herself from clawing at her throat to help her breathe.

Marion felt claustrophobic just thinking about it. Daphne had willingly lost her Dragon Fire. She couldn’t imagine what that had been like for her eldest daughter. It would’ve been like sucking the oxygen out of her lungs. The fire ran deeper in her than any biological matter; if Marion hadn’t seen herself bleed in the battlefield many times, she could’ve sworn her veins contained magma instead of blood. No amount of Belladonna’s ice could match the coldness of losing her flame.

As the pressure in her chest slowly lessened, Marion could feel a flutter inside it. Daphne had sacrificed everything to ensure the safety of both her little sister and her realm from the witches, and while the grave decision she’d been forced to make absolutely broke Marion’s heart, she couldn’t have been prouder of Daphne for making it.

The witches hadn’t been able to corrupt everything they’d touched, then, at least.

“We’ve raised a wonderful young woman”, Marion murmured, her words meant for her husband’s ears only.

Oritel squeezed her shoulder, his eyes stern but his smile genuine. “Yes, we have.” He turned to their friends while keeping his hold of Marion and continued, “Thank you. There’s a lot yet to be discussed, not least how grateful we are for everything you’ve done, but I think it would be for the best if we got some rest now.”

Having been preoccupied with the aspects of the distressing yet fascinating tales Faragonda and Saladin had shared, it was only after Oritel mentioned rest that Marion realized how utterly exhausted she was. She doubted she could shoulder much more information when what she’d learned was already making her insides sink. Smiling at her husband for the thoughtfulness, she let him help her up. Bidding a quick goodbye to Saladin, Griffin, and Hagen, Marion and Oritel followed Faragonda to a spare room, Marion savoring the feel of having Oritel close to her when he linked their arms to coax her to lean on him.

Marion could sense the coherence steadily evaporating from her, so to avoid words she didn’t have at the moment, Marion reached out to pull Faragonda in for a brief embrace before the woman took her leave. As much as Marion’s soul had wept during their conversation, she wasn’t so crippled by her own pain that she’d be blind to her friends’. Just because her daughters were at the front and center of her mind didn’t mean she hadn’t noticed how Faragonda had faltered while speaking about certain topics, how Griffin had avoided eye contact, how Saladin had hovered over both of them, or how Hagen had stayed in the background the entire time. She’d noticed and she swore to do something about it all as soon as she could spare one of the hands that were currently needed to squeeze the reins of her heart and brain with a force that turned her knuckles white.

* * *

Fire was comforting to her.

Oritel was the only one Marion had told that she found solace from natural fire, but sitting in front of the crackling fireplace and thinking there couldn’t be too many rooms in Alfea that had one, she wondered if Faragonda, too, had guessed at some point.

One more thing to thank her for, then.

Unable to fall asleep even though she would’ve liked nothing more than a few moments of oblivion that she hadn’t been able to reach for the past 17 years, Marion had sat beside the fireplace. She’d been quietly staring into the fire for so long that she had no idea how long it had been. She knew Oritel was nearby and probably worried about her, but he had let her be. Marion was pleased for she wasn’t sure she could move away.

She loved natural fire; the flames felt familiar even if they weren’t similar to hers. Her Dragon Fire, just like the animal it had first belonged to, was volatile and temperamental at heart but, in the right hands, dependable and loyal, agreeing to bow down to someone who treated it as an equal.

Natural fire was much more delicate, which somehow made it feel more sacred. The power was every bit as formidable as the flames inside her but flimsier without a connection to magic to preserve it, which fascinated Marion. The balance between destruction and elegance was the same but with an unpredictability that left people in awe. Fire was both feared and worshiped because it held immense power; it gave birth to life but could just as well take it away. Fire itself could be defeated with other elements such as water and air, but it never surrendered easily, clinging onto its right to exist with determination and greed, resilient till the very end.

Marion felt a certain kinship with that. The flame engulfing her heart was every bit as proud and independent, protecting her by claiming her as its own. It wouldn’t forfeit the control of any part of her, just as she’d be desperate to preserve the force giving her life.

Her eyes blindly staring into a mirror image of the flame inside her, Marion furrowed her brow as her thoughts traveled back to Daphne and the Dragon Fire she’d been forced to give away. Daphne had always had such a gentle, collected spirit that Marion wasn’t sure if her eldest was capable of being bitter about the situation. No matter, she could be bitter for both of them.

To rob someone of such an essential part of their self – Marion knew the flame had been every bit as integrated into Daphne’s soul as it was into hers, as it had been into her mother’s and grandmother’s and the mothers’ before them – was inexcusable. There was no dignity in such barbarity, the warrior part of her wondering whether she would rather have died on the battlefield than been violated like that.

To Marion, it didn’t matter that technically Daphne had made the decision herself. She’d lived through enough war to know that circumstances could force one’s hand just as much as a physical entity could. Daphne hadn’t had a choice.

However, while Marion agreed it had been the right thing to do, she couldn’t ignore the consequences of Daphne’s decision to abdicate her position as the guardian. The Dragon Fire was a tremendous responsibility, and for a child who hadn’t known… Poor Bloom.

Marion focused on the flames in the fireplace. They were beautiful: the smoldering coals that were strikingly red against the blue base of the flames, the centers of the flames that were so bright they were practically white and burned her eyes like they would burn anyone else’s skin, the tips of the flames that switched between yellow and orange as they tried to climb the air in spite of being firmly rooted to the ground, and the smooth and liquid-like edges that warded off the surrounding darkness the blaze was trying to conquer.

The dance was mesmerizing, but among all the gracefulness there was volatility and fury. Fire was pretty to watch but would burn if you didn’t respect its boundaries and tried to get too close. A small, silent flicker didn’t seem to have much power, but a raging fire hijacked your hearing just as well as all your other senses. The flames were so much more complex than they appeared to be.

Marion wasn’t worried about Bloom only because being a keeper of a cardinal magical power would lure in people for reasons that were misguided at best and deceitful at worst, or because guarding the Dragon Fire against those who were unworthy could require great sacrifices, but also because of the sheer amount of power. Marion knew how strong-willed the temper hidden inside her could be, especially in times of distress, and she’d seen the amount of destruction she was capable of if she let it take over. Therefore, it was crucial that the keeper learned to listen to her inner dragon and established a balance where she was in control but respected the power and the insight that came with having a connection to the Great Dragon. It was a great responsibility, but it was also a great honor. It was why Marion believed the Great Dragon had chosen to pass the fire along to the ruling family – they were already dutybound to protect Domino by any means. The Ancestral Witches hadn’t been the firsts to try to get their hands on one of the most powerful individual sources of magic known to the Magic Dimension. And thanks to Daphne, even though Domino hadn’t been spared, the Dragon Fire had stayed safe.

Marion clenched her jaw, pinching her mouth shut even when she already had trouble breathing, her chest hollow yet heavy. She should’ve been able to protect her planet and her people. She should’ve been able to protect her family. She and Oritel had trapped the Ancestral Witches, and their friends had then defeated Valtor, but Daphne’s sacrifice had ensured that there would’ve been no prize to claim even if the Company had failed. She’d been clever, brave, and altruistic to an extent her parents couldn’t have taught her – those attributes had been innate.

Daphne had always been eager to learn, her natural curiosity reminding Marion of her own younger self. Daphne had been more patient with her lessons, though. Like any child, there had been times she’d been restless and desired to do anything but sit still and read, but it had only taken Marion promising her daughter one of their special lessons for Daphne to agree to carry on with her scheduled teaching.

Spending time with her mother and grandmother during the times they’d taught her how to connect with the flame burning inside her were some of the rare memories from her youth Marion thought back to with fondness. She was even more fond of the moments when she had been able to pass those pearls of wisdom down to Daphne. It had been hard to convince her advisors to let her spend time with her daughter, but namedropping the Dragon Fire, that most of the court members still viewed with some kind of mixture of awe, mystery, and respect, had let her get her way more often than not with relative ease, and Marion hadn’t been above taking advantage of that.

Pleased to have found a way to trick the court, Marion had been shocked when Oritel had disagreed with her over stealing Daphne away for some fun. It had eventually boiled down to a rather nasty fight with Marion, atypically, walking away. It had been for the best, however, since after she’d cooled down, she’d been able to see past the hurt of Oritel accusing her of doing a disservice to their daughter by neglecting her studies in favor of practicing magic tricks and realize how out of character such a comment had been for him. By the time Oritel had come to look for her with a frantic apology, Marion had been waiting with a raised eyebrow, upset about his words and implications but also about whatever he hadn’t told her.

She could’ve guessed it if she hadn’t been nursing wounds of her own then, too. Since Oritel wasn’t royalty by birth, he’d always felt like he needed to be constantly proving his worthiness to everyone. It broke Marion’s heart even though she had been able to convince him that _she_ had never once thought he wasn’t good enough for her or Domino. But she also knew how much other people’s opinions could hurt, so she didn’t comment on the boasting when it was, in fact, insecurity.

And ironically enough, even though Oritel had always been the first and most vehement to tell Marion that the standards she’d adopted after years of being subjected to them deserved to _burn_ for making her feel like she wasn’t good enough, he’d tried to get Daphne to reach them. Not because he hadn’t thought she’d been the most wonderful thing in the universe, and perfect just the way she’d been, but because he’d never wanted her to feel inadequate about anything or in the presence of anyone.

Having spent every minute of motherhood trying her hardest not to repeat the mistakes her parents had made, Marion had understood Oritel’s need to protect their daughter from every threat imaginable. Oritel had realized he’d gone overboard himself and backed off, but the argument had gotten Marion to worry about Daphne’s eventual rule. There were so many things that changed along with the title – even for a crown princess who’d known what her destiny would be and had prepared for it her whole life. There were so many new expectations to meet and rules to learn. Marion had never doubted Daphne would make anything but a wonderful queen, but it was a big transition.

She almost choked on her heart as she realized Daphne would never get the chance to prove her right now. Bloom would inherit the throne instead.

Marion leaned on her hands that she tangled in the hair that fell on her face. She could’ve done without a political catastrophe – she had plenty of those in her personal life. But now this one had them intertwining.

Marion thought back to the fair-haired specialist Bloom had been with the first time she’d seen her after 17 years. She’d been – still was – comforted that Bloom had at least one person in her life who loved her, but she needed to see the situation beyond her role as a mother now, and the royal side of her was in distress. It didn’t matter to her, but Domino would care about the boy’s bloodline. Especially since from what little Marion had witnessed, it seemed Bloom was genuinely and intensely close to him. As a queen, Marion needed to disapprove of the situation until she’d gotten on top of it, even when she could hardly find it in her to feel anything other than a deep appreciation for the boy for giving her daughter some of the love she hadn’t been able to offer her herself.

She’d gathered from Faragonda that Bloom had been brought up in a good home, and even though the idea that it had been done by people who were complete strangers to her made her throat close, she was more grateful to them than she could ever express.

However, it left her with a problem she hadn’t needed to think about in decades. Bloom hadn’t been raised as a princess, but that didn’t annul her origin. She _was_ a princess, and Marion would have to address that fact soon. She’d need to present Bloom to the Dominian court and people.

Amidst all the chaos resulting from their liberation from Obsidian, Marion had managed to pull aside one of her advisors and given him temporary reins while she and Oritel would be at Alfea. She’d known that everyone had been bound to be scared and confused, and she’d ached to stay and to reassure them, but she’d also taken advantage of the fact that it had been one of the rare times she’d certainly been entitled to place her family first. Bloom was at Alfea, along with Marion’s friends, and answers.

After growing up elsewhere, Bloom’s home wasn’t in Domino. Marion could respect that, but Bloom couldn’t completely ignore or deny her origins either. The uncomfortable realization was that Marion had no idea how Bloom felt about her heritage – springing a country on a teenage girl overnight was surely never a good idea. Still, she needed to get Bloom up to speed as quickly as possible since whether Bloom was aware of it or not, Domino waited for them.

Marion would need to talk to Bloom. Truly talk to her, so that the girl would hear her and not scurry away after pleasantries. Marion didn’t know how to do that. She was used to being listened to, to all conversation halting when she opened her mouth. She knew that for some it was still out of obligation to her title rather than respect for her as a person, but it didn’t bother her as much as it used to. She’d grown up in a world dominated by men where her gender had mattered more than her title. Where there’d been times when simply being present had equaled being out of line. Marion respected traditions, but she’d refused to conform to those that would have meant signing away what had been rightfully hers. Domino’s royal bloodline consisted of only women; Marion saw it as a sign that the Great Dragon had chosen them as guardians, leaving men to rule as the front.

At any rate, her upbringing had worked to her advantage as feeling invisible and inaudible even when she’d been standing in front of a crowd of people or been the only one speaking in the room had forced her to learn how to make herself heard when people didn’t want to listen. But she didn’t want to resort to that with Bloom.

Marion’s very soul winced at the idea of making Bloom see her as a queen instead of her mother. She had tried to accept that it might very well be the case at the moment and for some time in the future, but she’d refrain from reinforcing that image.

She might be forced to, however. She didn’t know how accustomed Bloom was to the ways of royalty or how much she knew about them. She had no guarantees her daughter wanted to step up. And there laid the problem that broke Marion’s heart and had her grinding her teeth; it didn’t matter what Bloom wanted. She was a princess and she’d need to accept that and everything that came with it. And it was Marion’s duty as queen to see to it. The people of Domino needed to have their lost princess back at home, so they could start healing from the trauma that would linger in the bloodlines for generations to come.

But what would be the best way to present Bloom to the people? Bloom probably wouldn’t be too comfortable with a big ball, although it would not only be an effective way of showing her off but also good for the general morale.

Marion remembered her first big ball, and how nervous she’d been despite the glamour she’d been surrounded with and in awe of. She remembered Daphne’s first ball, too – how she’d weaved her daughter’s golden locks in an elaborate twist just like her mother had done with her hair, but with soft fingers and a soothing tone to try to ensure Daphne wouldn’t focus on the accidental pricks of the pins or the edge in her words as Marion had gone over what had been expected of her that night.

Daphne had acted beyond her years already back then, her nature perfect for shouldering the weight she carried in her blood and name. Marion cherished the moments they’d shared over learning etiquette and the ways of the court. She’d taught her daughter the official protocols, as well as the pointers passed down to her and the shortcuts she’d discovered herself. Daphne had picked up on everything rather quickly and had rarely complained, yet Marion had still occasionally remembered some new thing she’d failed to mention earlier.

She’d had years to teach Daphne. With Bloom, it was a matter of weeks, at most. A few short weeks to condense a lifetime’s worth of etiquette into.

A lifetime’s worth of being a mother.

Marion’s heart had been in a twist for the last 17 years, and this was the last turn. She could hear the way it tore; the shreds shot down to her stomach and climbed up her throat with a broken wail she couldn’t prevent.

Oritel was next to her in an instant, drawing her into him before she could even think about protesting, the crook of his neck a safer place to bury her face than her own hands. For just a few seconds, before her nose clogged up so that she could no longer detect his scent, Marion thought her tears would help cleanse her soul, but as Oritel tightened his grip on her, she gasped at the pain that wouldn’t subside. On the contrary, every tear running down her cheek burned worse than the previous one had. She whimpered, trying to pull back before she’d char Oritel’s skin, too, but he refused to let go of her, pressing a kiss in her hair with a shh that was probably meant to be soothing but lost half its effect due to the way his voice trembled.

Marion didn’t think she had room in her heart for any more pain but hearing the effect hers had on Oritel made her grab his shoulder to keep her from crumbling down physically as well as mentally.

She’d never felt smaller than right at that moment, trying to hide in Oritel’s embrace, his arms strong and sturdy between her and the rest of the world she hadn’t been a part of for nearly two decades.

But the world hadn’t stopped turning to miss her, so she’d missed everything. The time they had lost they could only make up for but never get back. Marion never got to hear Bloom’s first word or see her transform for the first time. She never got to teach her how to read or to swim. All the precious moments she had had with Daphne, she would never have with Bloom. And even all those dear, happy memories she had tucked deep inside her heart now had a green tint and were infecting her with bitterness for Daphne was cursed to being incorporeal and alone.

Marion felt Oritel’s hand in the back of her head, gently stroking her hair as if that could dissuade the pain. The reminder of his presence did make everything hurt less, though, as he knew what was going on in her mind. Everyone else could sympathize, but only he understood how debilitating her heartache was. She’d stood tall against her parents and the court and the Ancestral Witches but losing her daughters had brought her to her knees. And even Oritel could only offer so much solace, as he, too, was in the center of everything.

The outside world had broken into their bubble – the family that they’d built, and that had been their haven, where nothing should have touched them. And now their family had been broken and lost to politics, and war, and the cruelness of the world.

Marion couldn’t help but worry that she was to blame for all the anguish. Had it been retaliation from her choice of fiancé? Had her parents been right – had she disgraced Domino and thus earned the planet’s wrath upon her family?

It wasn’t fair. She’d been young when she’d found Oritel, but she had hardly been naïve when she’d given up on the idea of love already as a child. She’d thought there had been no room for love in the spacious rooms of the castle as they were reserved for rules and optics. She’d always been too much – too loud, too opinionated, too fiery. They’d beaten her mind to a small box just as they’d stuffed her body to a corset, essentially telling her the only part of her allowed to take up space was the helm of her dress.

It had taken years of loving Oritel and being loved by him in return to convince Marion she’d held her own against everyone trying to tear her down and that she was different from her parents. While pregnant with Daphne, she’d sworn to be a better mother than her own had been. She’d never wanted to subject her daughters to the kind of unsolicited criticism she had had to listen to her whole life, but this wasn’t how she’d meant to shield Bloom. Bloom had grown up away from them, apparently even unaware of them.

Although, maybe it had been better for Bloom as it had spared her from the questions no one in her life could’ve answered. Bloom hadn’t known they loved her, but at least she hadn’t been given the choice to doubt they did, either.

With the pressure and burn in her chest, Marion was sure her heart should’ve started to resemble the diamonds she was wearing around her neck. She almost hoped it would’ve. Being numb and impenetrable would make distancing herself from the decisions she needed to make easier.

Embracing her parentage had been a tried-and-true defense mechanism, but she couldn’t hide behind being queen anymore, not with Bloom. The memories of baby Bloom had never left her heart, but in order to be able to create more, Marion would need to open herself up to her daughter, which would surrender her incapable of controlling what found its way over her lowered walls. The pain would be worth it, a thousand times over, if it got her her daughter back, but she was worried about it becoming an impediment and limiting her ability to function as a queen should. She had the entire kingdom counting on her, and she didn’t want to let them down.

Fighting for a deep breath, not for her sake but to provide oxygen for her inner flame to keep it from dying out, Marion had to keep herself from clawing at Oritel in her desperation. She didn’t have a choice. She’d die before she’d abandon her daughter, and she’d have to be exiled before she’d abandon her people. Her parents had chosen Domino over her, but she would not follow in their footsteps. She’d face pain with her head up and walk through fire if she had to, but she refused to be forced to choose.

Because for once, her personal interests aligned with those of her kingdom, and she’d take advantage of that as if her life depended on it. They all wanted the same thing: to have Bloom back home.

Clutching at Oritel’s arms for support as she made up her mind, Marion let the last of her tears soak into his shirt before pulling away. She kept her head down, allowing the red curtain of curls to block her from his view as she wiped her cheeks dry with the back of her hand.

“I’m sorry”, she said, hiding her blotchy face from him as if without evidence, he would forget about her outburst. She hadn’t meant to add to his pain, would never intentionally be selfish enough to search to alleviate hers at his expense.

“Nonsense. Marion…”

With a featherlight touch, Oritel lifted her chin. His eyes blazed with such tenderness that Marion didn’t dare break the gaze even when its intensity pierced right through her.

“It’s okay. I’m here, and it’s just us, remember? It’s always okay.”

Unwilling to nod in fear of shaking his fingers away, Marion blinked in response, trying to force a smile on her face for compensation when she could no longer bear the weight of his stare and had to look down.

Oritel slid his hand so that he was cupping her cheek. Marion leaned into the touch for comfort, the sigh that slipped from her only dipped in contentment as she was still gathering herself. She placed her hand on Oritel’s thigh to show him she was trying to find her way back to him through the fog in her brain and around the shatters of her heart. She just needed a second. But as Oritel’s thumb started leisurely caressing her cheekbone, Marion looked up to realize his thoughts were somewhere else as well.

“Oritel?”

“You don’t know how long I’ve wished I was able to do this. How badly I yearned for it. To be able to touch you”, he said, staring at his fingers in wonder. He gathered a handful of her curls on his free palm. “To be able to feel your soft skin and silky hair.”

Marion thought she did know, but it didn’t exactly lessen the effect of his admiration. Marion bit down on her lower lip to keep herself in check, but the fervor and rawness in his eyes knocked the air out of her lungs when Oritel lifted his gaze back to her. Slowly, as if afraid she might disappear, he reached for her lower lip, pulling it down with his thumb to release her teeth’s grip on it.

“I love you.”

Marion had heard the declaration countless times in her life – Oritel would never let her forget or start doubting it – but she was afraid the weight of those words would shatter her as they crashed against her battered heart. She leaned in, leaving mere inches between them that she’d fill by returning the sentiment, hoping Oritel could taste the relief and desperation flowing from her and know how much she meant it.

“I love you”, she whispered, her lips so close to his that she parted them by opening her own. She stayed there, merely resting her mouth against his, reveling in having him near after so many desolate years apart. Only in his arms could she shut her eyes without the fear of finding Obsidian waiting for her once she’d open them, his familiar scent soothing the anxiety.

As if having read her thoughts, Oritel wrapped his arm around Marion’s waist, pressing her closer to him while he carefully opened his mouth, brushing his tongue against her lips. The invitation was clear and not unwelcome even if Marion had been content to just stay still and soak up his embrace. She let him in, holding her breath in worry that she wouldn’t remember what her husband felt and tasted like, but when Oritel gently sucked on her lower lip, the air came rushing out of her lungs as Marion’s memory jumpstarted.

She placed her hand in the nape of his neck, claiming control over the kiss that was infuriatingly gentle. She needed him to touch her in a way she would still be able to feel the next day, to push her until she reached her limit, to remind her what it was like to be real. At the moment, she didn’t want to remember she was anything but his wife.

Curling her fingers around the lapels of his shirt to keep him near even whenever they were forced to part to steal small gulps of air, Marion kept drowning herself in Oritel. He’d gotten the message, giving her as much as she could take, igniting her soul. One by one, she could feel parts of herself come back to life.

The sound of blood flow echoing in her ears and her lungs burning from the lack of oxygen, Marion finally pulled away. She kept her eyes closed as she touched her forehead to Oritel’s, calming down her breathing the best she could when she couldn’t help smiling.

Oritel grabbed Marion’s hand. “I dreamt of kissing you. All those years in Obsidian. It was torture, to have you so near but to still be alone. To know that _you_ were alone in that unholy darkness”, he said quietly, playing with her fingers and fiddling with her wedding ring. “I’m sorry. I blamed myself for the fact that you followed me, and so I blamed you for things you couldn’t have known. I should’ve talked to you about in private.”

“Yes, you should’ve”, Marion responded bluntly. “But I can hardly judge you for that when I was overreacting myself.”

“Everyone understood.”

Marion shook her head, though more in disbelief than disagreement since Oritel was right. Faragonda had accepted her unfair accusations calmly – worst of all, it hadn’t seemed she’d thought they’d been all that unfair, given the intensity with which Griffin had jumped to her defense. Griffin hadn’t been unreasonable, either, though, and Marion was both touched by and grateful of the lengths her friends had gone for Daphne and Bloom. She’d known she’d been able to count on them during the war, but they’d remained loyal as ever even after it despite the circumstances. She could only marvel at having earned that level of kindness and devotion.

“We’re fortunate to have such good friends”, Marion said.

“Indeed”, Oritel agreed.

“I’m worried about Hagen, though”, Marion confessed, pursing her lips as she thought back to how confused he’d looked every so often during their conversation. And more importantly, how he’d stayed in the opposite corner to Faragonda. “He was so… distant. You should probably talk to him.”

Oritel frowned. “I noticed that, too. I’ll find him tomorrow.” He lifted Marion’s hand to his lips. “And then we’ll go and introduce ourselves to our daughter properly.”

The idea brought tears to Marion’s still-sore eyes. Swallowing hard, she couldn’t do much else but nod enthusiastically. Oritel had the right outlook. Their past wouldn’t go away. They would have to learn to live with it, in spite of it. Their friends were all alive, and they had their kingdom back – they’d fix their family, too. At least now they had the chance to do that.


	5. Chapter 5 pt. 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Domino and its people are free, but the situation is far from settled for Griffin when the man responsible for all the destruction still hasn’t left her heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait! I, however, come bearing not only a new part but good news. We've reached the end of this fic, but since this last part got a little out of hand, I've split it into two. So you'll get one more chapter after this (as soon as I've edited it, which should be in a couple of days) ;)
> 
> I packed every single feeling I had left into this part, be warned. Copious amounts of self-loathing (courtesy of Griffin) and love (courtesy of Marion and Faragonda).
> 
> A real warning for a mention of suicidal thoughts in the second flashback. Pretty subtle and really brief, but so no one is taken by surprise.

_“It’s a lovely view.”_

_Griffin smirked, not turning her head to acknowledge Valtor’s presence as it didn’t come to her as a surprise. She’d sensed him a while ago already but had been too focused on astronomy to encourage him to interrupt her._

_“You’re going to have to do a lot better if you want to actually accomplish something. And by better, I mean less cheesy.”_

_She heard him chuckle before his arms wrapped around her waist, his breath suddenly brushing against her neck. “Would your feelings be terribly hurt if I said I was talking about the stars?”_

_Griffin rolled her eyes, hoping the darkness and the cool breeze sweeping past them hid the faint blush spreading on her cheeks. She knew he was messing with her and that it was just his scent and warmth infiltrating her personal space that affected her, but he’d only care about her reaction instead of the exact reasons behind it._

_“Although”, Valtor continued, “They’re not the only lovely creatures around here.”_

_“So, you’re resorting to the personification of heavenly bodies now in order to seduce me?”_

_That did get him to pause. Griffin smiled, keeping her eyes on the night sky since it was an even better way to tease him than letting him see she’d just chalked a win to herself in the nonexistent chart in her head._

_“You’re right; that’s probably not the way to sweet-talk to a nerd.”_

_Griffin whipped her head towards him, raising an eyebrow in lieu of her voice. “Excuse me?”_

_She hated her insides from betraying her and doing a flip at the rare sight of Valtor grinning. “Own it, Griffin.”_

_Griffin shook her head. “You’re doing a terrible job at… whatever it is you’re aiming at.” She narrowed her eyes at him, trying to deduce what it indeed was he had in mind. He was usually a lot more straight-forward with the things he wanted. “Let me know when I’m supposed to find you charming.”_

_Having expected to have managed to throw him off, Griffin was surprised when Valtor didn’t agree she’d gotten the last word. Instead, he retorted with barely missing a beat, “Usually by the time I get close enough.”_

_The casual shrug was evident in Valtor’s tone even when his shoulders remained still, and so it was without warning that he leaned in, Griffin cursing her body for reacting instantly to having him so near as her heart skipped a beat. She could feel the smugness radiating from him even before she felt his words, both of them tickling the side of her cheek as he lowered his voice to murmur, “When my breath hits your skin.”_

_He nuzzled his nose against the underside of her jaw. “When I’m so close I can smell your shampoo.”_

_As if to compensate for the fact that he pulled his right hand away from her, Valtor squeezed Griffin tighter against him with his left hand. Before Griffin could even notice the warmth that had left her waist, though, he’d wrapped a piece of her hair around his hand and tugged on it gently. Her response was involuntary, but her mouth fell open and she leaned back, slumping against his chest. She could feel his smile as she tilted her head automatically to the side he’d pulled on, simultaneously exposing more of her skin to him on the other side._

_He took immediate advantage of having succeeded in luring her into his trap by softly trailing his mouth from her shoulder up._

_”When I’m pressing kisses on your neck and I can feel your elevated pulse under my lips.”_

_Griffin wanted to protest, but the blood quickly rushing to her face as if it had been summoned by Valtor’s touch made her mouth too dry for words. Damn him. Valtor’s lips moved across her temple, his words resonating against her skin; Griffin’s body had given up all control and was obeying his words instead of her mind. She was pretty sure her heart had overthrown her ears._

_“When I’ve missed you.”_

_Griffin swallowed the gasp threatening to escape her at the delicate declaration as Valtor let it slip why he was acting the way he currently was. She seized his hand that was still wrapped in her hair, caressing his knuckles mindlessly as she turned her head to catch his eyes. They widened in realization, but he didn't look away since she’d already pressed her palm on his cheek gently. He leaned into it, confirming the idea he’d been worried about leaving her behind with his mothers. His care for her warmed her to the core, strengthening her determination to chase away the cold from him completely._

_Mindful of the lighting scar coloring her ribs, Griffin spun around, pressing her chest against his until she was so close that she had to tilt her head and rest her jaw on his sternum to be able to hold his gaze. Squeezing his fingers on the hand she still hadn’t let go of, she poured out the agony she’d been in for the past few days with him on a solo mission per the Ancestresses’ request – as another punishment for her failure the previous time – but made sure her distress wouldn’t hurt him by wrapping it up in a soft tone and enveloping it in the love that threatened to drown her if she didn’t let it out. “I missed you too.”_

_Valtor pushed her away just enough that he could bend down to kiss her. He held her neck with his other hand, guiding her lips to meet his as if her heart didn’t have the action in muscle memory. The night sky long forgotten, she yearned to trace the constellations on his skin, his eyes reflecting the glow of the stars brighter than any nebula._

_Melting into the passion he was pouring into her, Griffin lifted her arms around him to lock herself to him. She could feel the desperation in his touch and taste the question he hadn’t voiced on his lips. She did her best to soothe him, even when the effect his fingers had on her pulse as they found the skin above the waist of her skirt wasn’t only due to excitement._

_He’d see the bruise as soon as he’d take off her shirt. And he’d panic and blame himself. He’d be angry with his mothers. But he wouldn’t cross them, nor would she want him to. It had been her mistake, and he’d paid for things that hadn’t been his fault too many times in his life already, just as he would continue to. He was a dark wizard – that was enough justification to blame him for everything wrong with the world that told him_ he _was wrong. Not to mention the standards the Ancestresses held him to and had managed to make him hold himself to as well. He’d never stood a chance against everyone and everything controlling him, telling him what he should be and do, yet he’d maintained a capability to feel. To love. He’d only needed her to show him that part of himself while letting him see every part of her._

_Griffin trusted Valtor with everything. She’d have no qualms about laying her life in his hand – she did that every time she let him get close enough that she wasn’t sure she could continue breathing if he suddenly pulled away – but that didn’t extend to the rest of the Coven. She had no obligation to them. She hated that he felt like he did._

_She’d leave the Coven if he wanted to. They’d be hunted for sport if they did, but she would. For him. She’d do anything to protect him. To hell with the world that looked down on them and to hell with his mothers who made him feel like he was never enough. She’d be everything he’d need._

_But he couldn’t leave. So, she’d stay._

* * *

_“Hey.”_

_Griffin started at the sudden sound, turning around to find Marion with her hands raised in the air, the apology in her stance as well as on her face._

_“I’m sorry, I should’ve announced myself better. I didn’t intend to startle you.”_

_Griffin shook her head, denying the veiled assumption though she knew it to be true – she was still half-expecting Lysslis or one of her sisters to emerge from the shadows at any minute. Or worse, Valtor._

_“You didn’t, I was just…”_

_“Deep in thought?” Marion offered, the casualness of her voice strained enough to make Griffin wonder what the woman was actually thinking yet convincing enough for her pride to ignore the possibilities._

_“Yeah”, Griffin breathed, focusing her attention on the present time and company. She scanned Marion up and down, from the bags under her eyes to the hand she’d lowered to the curve of her stomach, more noticeable in the silky robe she had on compared to her daytime attire. “Are you all right? Why are you awake at this hour?”_

_Marion offered a rueful smile. “For the same reason as you, I imagine.” She sighed, absentmindedly caressing her bump as she gazed at the stars Griffin had been trying to find comfort from a moment ago. The forlorn look on her faze morphed into a curious frown._

_“Why do you like the stars, Griffin?”_

_Taken aback by the abrupt change of topic, Griffin merely blinked a few times while her brain processed the question. Marion generally spoke with purpose and logic, her arguments as polished as her vocabulary, so it was rare for Griffin to find her train of thought arbitrary._

_Aiming her gaze back to the sky, Griffin searched for the right words to explain how looking at stars that were too far away to radiate anything else than light still managed to bring her warmth._

_“I guess… They’re a reminder that there are bigger things out there in the universe, things that time can’t touch. Things that we barely have an effect on. It’s inspiring, in a way.”_

_Marion was silent for a while before she hummed. “I can understand that – the vastness of the universe is humbling. But doesn’t it ever make you feel lonely?”_

_Not really, Griffin thought, furrowing her brows as she wondered which answer Marion wanted to hear. Stars had been her greatest comfort ever since she’d been a little girl; there were only three people in the entire world whose arms had managed to offer better solace. At times, she hoped she’d settled for the heavenly bodies instead of physical ones._

_She supposed that she needed to concede to Marion’s point of view, though it had nothing to do with the stars themselves and only with the feelings she associated with them. For even the stars couldn’t chase away the loneliness when it was the ghost of Valtor’s touch that kept her company, making her yearn for the man himself with only the night sky playing witness to her lapse in morality. Hugging herself to keep the memories inside, Griffin fought a shiver, mistrusting her ability to hide its cause from Marion as the night was warm and the woman’s eyes were keen._

_Luckily, Marion didn’t seem to mind Griffin’s lack of an answer. “Do you know what’s funny?” she asked, and though her voice was soft enough not to be classified as bitter, it was clear she didn’t find whatever she was about to say funny at all. She looked down, cradling her stomach with both hands. “I have a constant companion now. But I’ve never felt more alone.”_

_Griffin opened her mouth, the urge to say something strong, but she’d never been good at platitudes. Hoping that had been Marion’s intention all along, Griffin resorted to showing her support via body language by turning to fully face her friend as she continued._

_“I haven’t told Oritel. I don’t want to worry him, nor to offend him. He’s been wonderful – you all have, and I’m more grateful for that than I’m sure I can express.” Marion took a breath, her eyes frantic as they settled on Griffin’s face even though the rest of her body seemed to have frozen into a shield between the world and the baby inside her. “But in the end,_ I’m _responsible for her. It’s my body she’s growing in, my heartbeat she’s hearing. I’m carrying the world inside me and yet-“_

_Marion hardened her features, but the tremble in her lower lip before she caught it between her teeth managed to shake Griffin, too._

_“I’ve never felt this powerless. This… insignificant.”_

_The whisper was so silent Griffin doubted she would even have heard it if the confession hadn’t resonated loudly with her._

_Powerless, Griffin could relate to easily. They’d had a few successes lately, but their small victories weren’t enough. Not compared to what they stood to lose._

_Insignificant was trickier. In every new plan she came up with, she could see her old handprint on the reverse side. And no matter what she did, it always seemed greater than her current. She hadn’t been insignificant before, but she was now, which was twice as cruel._

_Griffin understood what Marion had meant, but she decided she couldn’t allow herself to stay quiet, as meaningless as her words would prove to be. She wasn’t looking to make things better for the world was falling apart around them faster than they could keep it from doing that, let alone put it back together, but she could state the facts._

_“I can feel your Dragon Fire across the battlefield”, she said. “Your aura is invigorating whether or not you’re actively using your powers. I sense it now, standing next to you – even in the middle of the night when you’re asleep.”_

_It_ was _captivating; Griffin’s magic hadn’t stopped responding to the Dragon Fire even when it was the wrong type just as her heart hadn’t stopped responding to the thought of Valtor even when it was wrong. Marion’s and Valtor’s flames shared enough similarities for people not attuned to one or the other to mix up the two._

_However, Griffin had been more intimately acquainted with Valtor’s Dragon Fire than anyone else aside from himself – including his mothers – had. They’d shaped him from the flame themselves, but handcrafting a magical artifact could never come close to loving the man embodying the flame. She’d felt all of him, shared all of him. His body, his magic, his soul._

_Griffin broke Marion’s gaze before her thoughts got away from her. She’d let Marion see her cry over Valtor once, and that was once too many for a woman whom he was targeting directly. Especially when Griffin could find fault in every other decision she’d made in her life, but she couldn’t bring herself to regret meeting him. Even if her memories wouldn’t turn to gold like they were supposed to but rather get corroded by time. Even if she had to wonder if anything good had come out of them being together._

_She supposed it had to have. They’d been driven apart for they hadn’t been meant to last, but they would never have met if it had all been in vain._

_She just hoped the only purpose hadn’t been her helping the Coven get more powerful. She couldn’t think the universe would be so cruel, even to a witch. There’d be too much collateral damage for an act of revenge against a single human being._

_She hoped so, at least._

_“Thank you.”_

_Marion’s voice provided the rope Griffin grasped with both hands in order to pull herself back to the surface. She nodded, letting the genuine appreciation and soft wonder bring a hesitant smile to her face as well._

_“I’m glad you’re with us, Griffin. Your plans have had a higher success rate than Oritel’s – as much as he despises to admit it”, Marion smirked._

_Griffin’s smile grew even when she was still processing the fact that Marion had told her that she valued her expertise more than her husband’s. Marion was a proud woman, but whereas Oritel crossed over to arrogant, sincerity was one of the main characteristics that kept Marion on the other side of the line. Griffin appreciated hearing Marion say she’d been useful; she could almost believe it then._

_“He couldn’t be too pleased to hear you say so.”_

_Marion chuckled, not rushing to blindly defend her husband but showing she was all right with making a little fun of him when he was acting like a fool. For Griffin, that had been a major sign Marion might be worth letting in – along with Faragonda’s vouching and the constant push on Marion’s part. The Queen of Domino wasn’t completely blinded by her righteousness and her position as a leader of the planet the Great Dragon herself had deemed the worthiest out of all others. Even though born with a silver spoon in her mouth, Marion had proved herself capable of thinking on her own instead of accepting at face value the distorted views of those who believed her to be nothing less than the savior of all light magic, or something equally pretentious._

_“Probably not”, Marion admitted._

_The thought of Oritel’s shocked face made Griffin chuckle. She ran a hand through some strands of hair that the breeze was pushing on her face, intending to push them back over her shoulder, but her fingers got caught in a small knot and instead of pushing, she ended up pulling._

_Shivering as if she’d been hit with one of Tharma’s lightning bolts, Griffin played with the ends of her hair in her hand, numb to the feel of silky texture she was carefully untangling. All levity had leaked right out of her._

_“He doesn’t trust them”, she said, not really knowing why she’d done so when she couldn’t keep the vulnerability out of her voice. Even when it wasn’t an accusation but merely a statement. “My plans.”_

_The implication went unsaid, but Griffin knew Marion had heard it since the latter sighed._

_“He does”, Marion countered, soft but straightforward as she continued, “It does not always seem like it, but he does, just as I do. Now. Given your… association with Valtor and the rest of the Coven, we couldn’t afford to be wrong. You understand that, I’m sure."_

_Griffin did understand. She’d worked with the Coven, which made her a murderer. And she’d turned on them, which made her a traitor. Neither of those served her well in her present company._

_At Griffin’s nod, Marion reached to quickly squeeze her hand that was resting on the railing. “Oritel’s just… scared. Like we all are. The Coven is out for blood. Those hags are out for everything that keeps the universe in its current state, trying to harness so much darkness that they can poison everything around them with it.”_

_Griffin agreed to an extent, but she didn’t voice her thoughts, unsure if Marion would approve. And at any rate, she didn’t want to shift the focus away from Marion who needed to let it all out. Griffin was worried that the rage in her voice, if buried, would eventually burn the baby._

_“Oritel is scared of something happening to me. I am, too. Not for my sake, but… for my daughters’. I couldn’t bear the thought of Bloom needing to grow up without her parents. And Daphne… She’s becoming a beautiful woman, so quickly, but she’s too young to become queen. I’d never want that burden for her. Thinking that I wouldn’t be able to be there to help my girls and see them grow up is the worst thing I can imagine.” Marion was quiet for a while. “Of course, what would be even worse would be…”_

_Griffin didn’t need Marion to finish the sentence to guess what she’d meant. Griffin hadn’t yet considered becoming a mother herself – the thought was pointless now that the only man she could’ve wanted as the father to her children was trying to kill her – so she couldn’t relate, but she understood. She wished she could’ve told Marion that Bloom, at the very least, would be safe, that the Coven wouldn’t kill a_ baby _. Instead, she kept her mouth shut, unwilling to lie to Marion even if the woman might have preferred it to the silence that was trying to smother them._

_Griffin didn’t think too long ahead. Her life was days at a time, pushing through the darkness of the night only to realize the rising sun didn’t erase it come the day. But she understood it was different for Marion – it was what she was fighting for. For a future. For herself and especially for her children._

_Griffin was worried about dying, too, but not for the same reasons as Marion. She barely had anyone to leave behind; Faragonda’s outlook on life would get the fairy through everything, and as much as Griffin would hate to cause grief to her mother especially after the loss of her father, she knew now her mother could handle it. She was more worried about_ what _she’d leave behind. Her legacy couldn’t be the misstep her heart had spoken her into. The mark she left in the world couldn’t lead to its destruction._

_She needed to fix it. That was why the idea of meeting her end on the battlefield was enough to wake her up in cold sweat in the middle of the night. She couldn’t die before she’d fixed what she’d started. On her darker days, Griffin thought that without the burning guilt that every beat of her heart pushed into her throat, she would’ve tried to find a way to stop it from beating altogether. But she couldn’t. That was the one possible step down she had left; she’d hold on to the last shreds of integrity with everything she had. And hope to hell there would be some significance to that decision._

_Focused on dwelling on her supposed worth, Griffin wasn’t the least bit aware of her actual physical self and thus had no chance of masking the jump Marion caused when she spoke again._

_“Do you regret killing people?”_

_Breathless, Griffin turned to look at Marion, but the woman refused to give anything away with her demeanor, once again leaving Griffin with only her own sense of judgment – even when Marion should have known firsthand how terrible of an idea that always was._

_Griffin could’ve lied. Maybe she should’ve even. But she wanted to see how Marion would react. They were friends; maybe she wanted to see how long that would last. So, she fought the urge to curl her fingers, making sure to look Marion in the eye as she answered, “Not all of them. Do you?”_

_“I always regret having to kill”, Marion said quickly, flicking her eyes to the ground. She took a deep breath before continuing, “But not the act itself, no.”_

_Griffin swallowed her surprise, relaxing her hands that she’d subconsciously clenched into fists in expectation of Marion’s answer. She kept her face expressionless, devoid of the judgment Marion hadn’t sprung on her, either. Not that she had any such feelings. Moral wise, she wasn’t one to speak – just because she’d left the Coven before she wouldn’t have been able to live with the things she’d done, didn’t mean it was easy now either. But she hadn’t expected the queen of Domino to justify murder, let alone admit it._

_Marion looked at Griffin carefully. “I’ll kill him. If I get the chance.”_

_It felt presumptuous to ponder deeper reasons for Marion’s statement, but Griffin could feel Marion waiting for her reaction. She didn’t know what that should’ve been, though._

_“He’ll do the same.”_

_The words had slipped easily from her tongue even when it felt to be glued to the roof of her mouth. Griffin didn’t know whether to excuse the morbidity of the truth by the darkness around them or inside her as she thought about Marion and Valtor dueling till death **,** tripping over her heart even as a mere hypothetical spectator. _

_Marion squared her jaw and nodded; the fire in her eyes made Griffin feel a little less guilty for forgetting to sugarcoat her words in her panic of coming up with a response._

_“And until then?” Griffin asked despite herself._

_Marion clicked her tongue in thought. “We do what’s right.”_

_“No matter the consequences”, Griffin agreed. “But how do you know what’s right?” She was genuinely curious and desperate enough to get a glimpse of the righteous light shining inside Marion that she didn’t care if Marion could hear all of that in her voice._

_Marion tilted her head, her gaze softening into something between sadness and hope – a combination unique to her. “You don’t. You just choose every time, and each time pray to the Dragon that it is not the day your luck runs out.”_

* * *

“Griffin!”

Griffin looked up at the sound of her name to find Marion walking towards where she was sitting, enjoying the sunrise and the peace lingering on Alfea’s courtyard early in the morning.

“Marion.” Griffin tried not to sound or look as surprised as she was. “Good morning."

“Good morning. I see you’re still an early riser.”

Griffin smirked. “Force of habit by now. Becoming a professor isn’t really the career choice for someone looking to sleep in.”

Marion chuckled lightly, her smile wider than Griffin would’ve expected. She raised an eyebrow but didn’t get to asking before Marion replied, “I heard you became the head of Cloud Tower. I’m glad; it suits you.”

Taken aback, Griffin murmured a thank you. Going into academics had been self-evident all along, but she hadn’t set out to become an educator. Especially considering her lapse to the immoral side of dark magic.

“Have you checked in, to make your school still stands in your absence?” Marion asked, and from the gleam in the corner of her eye, Griffin knew she was teasing her.

“Yes, I just came back. I wouldn’t have had any classes today, so there was no need for big schedule changes. And I’m always happy to delegate paperwork.”

Griffin laughed at Marion’s expression that made it clear she shared the dislike.

“It’s good your students won’t miss anything, then.” Marion’s smile didn’t lose its warmth even when it settled into something more neutral as she continued, “Speaking of students, that’s why I’m up this early myself – to avoid the morning rush. I was hoping you would escort me to the library, Griffin.”

“Me?”

“I assumed you’d know where it is”, Marion said.

Griffin rolled her eyes but got up. “Of course”, she answered, aware it suited both statements.

Marion had picked a good time; the grounds were indeed devoid of students, and the pair could comfortably fall into a leisured pace as they crossed the yard and stepped into the shade of corridors.

“I’d forgotten how beautiful Alfea is”, Marion commented, looking around. “It’s nice to see it again.”

Griffin hummed, having to admit that even when it didn’t compare to Cloud Tower, there was something inviting about the round arches and spaciousness of Alfea. She hadn’t forgotten the times the school had offered a safe haven to her, either. Out loud she said, however, “I’ve always found the pink rather garish.”

It was true, but Marion caught the playful intention and laughed. “You did always favor a darker color scheme. I see it still holds”, she gestured to Griffin’s burgundy dress. “Although… you’ve changed your hair.”

Griffin raised her eyebrows before shrugging. “I wanted something different but couldn’t bring myself to cut it.”

Marion’s compliments drowned under the sound of blood rushing in Griffin’s ears. She pushed the memories back and forced herself to focus on Marion when the woman opened her mouth again.

“Maybe I should do something to my hair, too. It has to be awfully out of style by now”, she said, twirling one of her signature curls around her finger.

Griffin smirked, unable to picture Marion without her voluminous do. “Speaking of style, it’s weird seeing you in a dress again. I’d grown accustomed to the battle wear already.”

Marion huffed out an exaggerated breath. “As had I! It was so much easier to move in. Honestly, I’d take chest armor over these corsets any day.”

Griffin chuckled along with Marion, but the topic of war having come halted the easy conversation. A silence settled, heavy and dry, dragging Griffin’s eyes to the floor and clogging up her throat. She hadn’t realized she’d stopped walking before the helm of Marion’s dress entered her line of sight, the woman having stepped to face Griffin.

Marion’s voice was quiet and hoarse as she asked, “It’s true – Valtor really came back?”

Griffin tried to hide the shiver running through her at Valtor’s name, worrying she wasn’t very successful since she’d forced herself to look up at the same time. She didn’t trust herself to speak about him – not with Marion, who’d lost everything because of him. (She had, too, but her everything seemed so insignificant in comparison.) She barely dared move, managing a small nod as she watched Marion for her reaction, listening to the cracks under the thin layer of ice she was standing on to see if she’d fall into the freezing lake or not.

“I’m so sorry, Griffin.”

She was in the lake – not because she’d fallen through the ice but because someone had removed the clouds and the sun had melted the ice under her feet. She opened her mouth, half-convinced she’d fill her lungs with water, but she needed to replace the air that had escaped them.

By a small miracle, Griffin managed to answer without choking or drowning, “There’s no need.”

She hadn’t specified the reason, taking advantage of the fact Marion had misguidedly been graceful enough not to either. That way, she could pretend Marion was only sharing her condolences since they’d had to fight a power-hungry, vengeful maniac threatening to take over the universe for the second time. That way, she could pretend Marion didn’t know it had never been that simple or honorable for her. Didn’t know her heart separated the man from his actions, even after how long it had been and everything that had happened.

“He’s”, Griffin paused to swallow, still refusing to say Valtor’s name out loud, “he’s gone now. For good.”

Considerate as ever, Marion just looked at Griffin, her face neutral when she nodded. So, even though Griffin knew it wasn’t the right emotion to show, she forced herself to smile in return, because Marion deserved something at least.

There was something else Marion deserved, too.

“Thank you. For putting an end to the Ancestral Witches when we couldn’t.”

The gratitude was long overdue. Or rather, expressing it was; Griffin had already spent every day since Domino’s last thanking the ghosts of her friends for vanquishing the ghosts of her past.

Marion smiled in a way that didn’t reach her eyes and shook her head. “Thank you for everything you did that day, as well, and every day after it.”

Griffin was about to protest, but Marion interrupted her.

“I’m serious, Griffin. I’m sorry for the pain our _disappearance_ caused, but I want to thank you for moving on; we hardly deserve the legacy you all have made sure we have.”

Griffin turned her head away. They hadn’t even talked about it as it had been obvious in all of their minds that the Company of Light deserved none of the praise without all of its members present. It had been a silent decision made in the middle of heartbreak, but Griffin knew none of them had questioned it afterwards. Oritel and Marion had made the ultimate sacrifice and their kingdom had borne the heaviest burden. _That_ was something to admire. The rest of them shouldn’t have been rewarded for merely surviving the war, nor thanked for honoring the ones who’d made it possible.

Wavering under the softness of Marion’s gaze, Griffin swallowed around the wetness gathered in her throat. “The best legacy you have are your daughters. Bloom and her friends were the ones who eventually stopped… Valtor.”

Griffin winced inwardly at the way her tongue had curled around Valtor’s name, savoring each syllable like it was a language of its own. It dissolved into the acid in her mouth, dripping towards her heart that was already ashamed for the reaction. Griffin could only hope Marion couldn’t see how her body was betraying her friend.

But of course, Marion had focused on another name. It was as if she’d entered a haze: her perfect posture slackened a little, the green of her eyes dimmed, and the smile on her face was the definition of bittersweet. Griffin winced again.

“Griffin… please, just tell me anything about her.”

At a loss, Griffin tried to come up with something. She didn’t feel comfortable sharing anything personal about Bloom – anything her mother _should_ know. Even if that had been exactly what Marion had asked for, it felt like rubbing salt into old wounds that hadn’t even gotten a chance to heal yet. Besides, Griffin didn’t really know Bloom that well; for some reason, she suddenly felt guilty about that, too, even when it went against her previous feelings and was the logical consequence of Bloom attending Alfea instead of Cloud Tower.

Marion was looking at her like she was noticing her hesitance, so Griffin scrambled to say something before the woman would beat her to it. She needed to be able to offer Marion that much.

“Her aura is akin to yours.”

It was pathetic as far as observations went, but it had been the first thing Griffin had noticed. Bloom shared several physical features with Marion, most obvious of which the flaming red hair, but the magical imprint of the Great Dragon was prominent and unmistakable.

Their similarity didn’t come from having the same power, though. Every keeper had their own signature. And that was what was so fascinating to Griffin. She’d met Daphne, too, when the girl had been the keeper, and her signature had been different. One’s magical aura had nothing to do with one’s personality – or maybe it did, but only with the one that was linked to the power. In Marion’s case, that excluded her much more demure court alter ego, which explained why Bloom’s and Marion’s magic was similar when they fought despite their differences character-wise. Griffin had been distracted during the first moments of the battle in Alfea because of that, and she’d had to try her best to shut out both the mental and physical reactions to suddenly being in the proximity of the Dragon Fire again.

Marion had expressed an interest in Griffin’s talent of identifying magical imprints, so Griffin tried to explain her thoughts, as awkward as it felt when Marion hung on her every word. Griffin didn’t blame her, but she felt ill-suited to talk about Bloom; Faragonda would’ve known the girl much better and thus been able to provide better insight.

“You’ve seen her fight?” Marion asked.

Griffin nodded, hesitating a little as her mind raced through all the ways she could’ve stopped those battles from being necessary, but she hadn’t.

“I don’t even know my daughter’s magic.” Marion shook her head with a dry chuckle that contrasted the shimmer in her eyes. She drew in a breath. “Thank you, Griffin.”

Griffin bit her tongue to keep herself from belittling her contribution lest she offended Marion. She was both disbelieving and relieved to have been able to offer her friend some comfort. 

Marion shifted her feet, cautious with her following question. “And you said she was involved in stopping Valtor for good?”

Griffin summoned all her strength to offer Marion a genuine smile. “Like mother, like daughter.”

Marion laughed in surprise before gathering herself again. “I’m glad we were there with you in some way, at least, then. Bloom should never have had to see evil as we have, but… I’m proud of her, and I would’ve hated the idea of you needing to face him on your own.”

Griffin fought to keep her smile up a couple of seconds in response to Marion’s touching sentiment but gave up when the darkness got too heavy. “You’re right, she should never have been there. Faragonda did everything she could to deter her from going after Valtor, but Bloom is curious and stubborn, and Valtor is- _was_ a good manipulator. He appealed to her, given his connection to Dragon Fire and the answers he taunted us all with about… what had happened to you.”

Griffin escaped the raw emotion on Marion’s face by looking away. “I can’t fault Bloom for wanting answers. We all did.”

Marion swallowed thickly. “I understand that. The agony of not knowing is among the rare tragedies that don’t get better with time.”

Griffin frowned. “Marion?”

Marion shook her head, which only made Griffin’s worry tenfold. She already regretted everything she’d said even when most of it had been things Marion had specifically asked about. Griffin would rather have stayed quiet, but since she trusted Marion’s judgment, trying to protect the woman by not discussing things that hurt would only have been selfish.

“It would be unfair to you. There’s no need for you to feel guilty about it.”

“I’ll feel guilty anyway”, Griffin exclaimed, too wrapped up in her determination to get Marion to cave in to appreciate the short laugh she’d drawn from the woman. “Marion, please – if there’s anything I can do to help, I want to. Don’t mince your words around me.”

Marion sighed, continuing to stroll down the hall. Griffin started after her, relieved to match Marion’s slow pace; it didn’t seem the woman was trying to get away from Griffin so much as her thoughts.

“It’s just…” Marion began, wringing her hands. “I was conscious, in Obsidian, more or less. I had tied my physical form to Oritel’s sword, and the negative energy was repressing my magic, but despite my dulled senses, I still could observe my surroundings. For 17 years, I was by myself in the darkest, most unholy place in the entire Magic Dimension.”

Griffin fought a shiver from imagining how that must have felt but also because of the cold the familiar-sounding tale conjured on her skin.

“I worried. And I hoped. There wasn’t much else to do”, Marion said dryly. “But now I don’t need to worry anymore when I’ve seen how you all have pushed through and survived, and I don’t need to hope because I have my family and friends right here – only I still worry and I still hope because Bloom doesn’t know me, and Daphne… It feels as if I have one physical and one psychical daughter, and neither of them is fully mine.”

Marion let go of her hands with a flourish that Griffin wasn’t used to seeing from the calm and controlled woman. Frustration colored Marion’s voice as she exhaled. “I am still kept from my daughters. And I enjoy your company, Griffin, but it pains me to be separated from Oritel.” She managed a smile. “I followed him to the depths of darkness, and we still couldn’t be together. I guess it was due to my decision to an extent, though it wasn’t my fault. But we were kept apart for so long I was afraid I’d forget what it had felt like to touch him.”

With a glance at Griffin, Marion added carefully, “You probably know how that feels.”

Griffin wasn’t sure if she’d stopped dead in her tracks purely from the shock or because her mind had shut down every other function aside from the flood of memories of soft fingers on her cheek, warm lips against her ribs, and flaming eyes behinds bars that were plaguing her mind. The ghost of _his_ touch lingered on her broken heart and yearning flesh.

“I…”

She wanted to deny whatever Marion was thinking, to denounce Valtor completely, but with her brain out of commission, she had nothing to help her form the lies she would’ve needed to utter. The words got blocked by her heart that had risen to her mouth until she’d missed the critical period within Marion _might_ have believed her if she’d protested. There was no hiding anymore; her soul was spread out in the hall, coal-black against the bright pink of the walls. Griffin worried Marion might see Valtor’s fingerprints not just on her soul but on her person as well.

Griffin could barely hear Marion’s sigh from the sound of her pulse in her ears.

“Griffin…”

Having been avoiding Marion’s eyes for a good while, Griffin was taken by surprise when the woman reached for her hands. She jerked away automatically. How could Marion stand to touch the hands that she knew had caressed the man responsible for the destruction of her family and kingdom?

“Why would you say that?”

If she’d felt like she had an ounce of right to be angry, Griffin would’ve been, but the question came out whiny instead. The confusion would’ve been genuine in both cases, though. There was no way Marion, who only ever spoke with deliberation and care, would’ve let slip something with such a connotation without having meant to do so. Even when anger had sharpened her words till they could cut, she stood behind her statements, only apologizing for the _way_ she’d said something.

So why would she bring up Valtor? The only reason Griffin could think of was that Marion had finally realized how corrupted their friendship was – but even when Griffin deserved all the blame, she couldn’t picture Marion creating an ambush like that.

Marion’s gaze was gentle. “Because 17 years have gone by, but I still know you, and many things have changed, but you still look like you can scarcely breathe under all that guilt.”

Marion’s tone was so brutally honest Griffin couldn’t doubt her even through the shock, nor could she stop the tears from brimming into her eyes from the broken yet soft-edged voice that was offering her the absolution she yearned for more than anything.

That time, she didn't have strength left to pull away when Marion took her hands. “You’re not just your feelings, Griffin. Love never made anyone a bad person. You’ve shown you can think around your heart, and I respect that.”

Griffin turned her head away, afraid of what Marion would see on her face now that the woman had broken through every single defense and stripped her down to her battered heart and lost idealism. Even more afraid of the burning sensation running down her cheeks as her wounded soul let out the venom that had been festering ever since she’d left Valtor’s bed in the dead of the night for good and ached to turn back every step of the way. Her tears were of no use anymore with only the memory of him able to receive them – especially now that the memory in Griffin’s mind was vastly different from the one in the mind of the Dominian queen standing too close to leave Griffin any possibility of hiding.

Griffin had failed in keeping her emotions to herself, and she’d failed in keeping Marion from seeing them, so the only thing left that could possibly salvage the situation somewhat was to face it head-on. She’d need to force her body to cooperate long enough so that she could explain she wasn’t weeping because of what Valtor and the Coven had done but because of what they hadn’t managed to do.

Marion hadn’t let go of Griffin, her touch as warm as ever, as if the past didn’t make her blood run cold like it made Griffin’s at the moment, only the burn of shame and the incomprehensible grace Marion was extending to her melting the ice formed around her heart. But the half she’d left behind years ago remained just as frozen as the man who held it. And Marion claimed to know that. Claimed to not only know that but accept that. Even after everything Valtor had done in the name of revenge and after how much his heartbreak had cost her and everyone she held dear.

It had to be the belief that Marion was under the protection of the Great Dragon herself. There was no other explanation for how she could still be standing after all that she’d gone through. However, despite Griffin’s complicated relationship with the universe, she didn’t find an ounce of resentment in her at the idea. Only deep gratefulness for the friend she should never have been able to make. Thank the Dragon for returning Marion to her.

In a bout of reckless affection, Griffin drew Marion in for a hug. She couldn’t speak, but Marion had always been intuitive, so maybe she could communicate in a non-verbal way. The apology and thank you she owned Marion were beyond words anyway. After that, she could accept whatever reaction Marion would have to her impulsiveness. 

The last of her fear dissipated when Marion made no move to push her away, waiting instead for Griffin to break them apart, which she did after a while. Staying closer than she’d been comfortable with earlier with past mistakes wedging themselves between them, Griffin tried for a smile that, for the first time in their conversation, came without resistance. “I’ve missed you.”

It was true, although she hadn’t realized it before. Both the actual friendship and the memory of it had been tainted with guilt – the former over the war and the latter over its end. The guilt hadn’t left room for realizing how much Griffin had enjoyed Marion’s company and how good of a friend she’d been. She’d never before felt as light in Marion’s presence.

“And I, you. I’m so relieved you’re here – I truly am, Griffin, I’m-”, Marion bit the inside of her cheek, “I was so afraid of the reality that would await us if we ever got out of Obsidian that I hardly dared think about it. I spend a lot of time wondering what I had done wrong to be submitted to such a cruel faith, but now… I can’t help wondering what I’ve done right for so many that I love to have been spared from that, or from worse.”

Just like her words were doing to Griffin’s heart, Marion leaned in to squeeze Griffin’s arm, her touch steadier than her voice had been.

Griffin was pretty sure most if not all of them would rather not have been spared at the time even though Marion and Oritel’s return had changed things. Getting sucked into Obsidian hadn’t sprung to Griffin’s mind amid the heartbreak caused by all the theories of their disappearance. Hearing Marion’s relief over their survival, however, made Griffin decide against voicing those thoughts and instead, focus on something more positive.

“We would’ve been utterly lost without Faragonda. It was she who kept us all from falling apart. Or me, most of all…” Griffin drifted off with a dry chuckle, hesitant to bare any more of her bleeding soul she was still scraping up off the floor.

Marion smiled in a way Griffin found herself having missed – the condescending and pitying tones were masked behind impeccable manners and genuine care so well she didn't mind them when she knew there was no malice behind the action. “Faragonda spoke similarly of you. I’m really glad you had each other to lean on.”

Foregoing the shock or the frown that would’ve genuinely shown on her face, Griffin smiled in response. Her mind, however, or what was left from it at that moment when she still needed to dedicate a part of it to the chat Marion insisted on continuing as they started towards the library once more, had plunged deep into the depths of her memories. Her friendship with Faragonda was so long and powerful that Griffin barely remembered the time before she’d known she always had at least one person to rely on. Faragonda had always been there for her; it had never occurred to Griffin that the sentiment could apply the other way around, as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second part coming soon! In the meanwhile, I'd love it if you told me what you thought of this :)


	6. Chapter 5 pt. 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keep in mind Griffin is not a reliable judge of character when it comes to herself. (Meaning I’m not the one who hates her, please don't come at me, I love her xd)

With Griselda standing guard somewhere else – probably busy keeping the fort up so that Faragonda could concentrate on matters taking place at but not relating to Alfea – Griffin could slip into Faragonda’s office with no grander an announcement than a gentle knock on the door.

Faragonda was standing by the window and turned around swiftly. “Griffin!”

Griffin frowned at the slight shock in Faragonda’s voice. “Hey. I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”

“No, no”, Faragonda rushed to assure. “I just wasn’t expecting you.”

She hadn’t expected _anyone_ , Griffin surmised. Alfea did feel abnormally quiet, even if it was getting late. “Did Saladin leave for Red Fountain already? I passed him in the hall earlier, and he mentioned something about getting back to work.”

Faragonda nodded. “He did. Apparently, there was an incident with the dragons, and it required Codatorta’s full attention, so Saladin needed to go take charge of everything else.”

Griffin parroted the nod. “I see.”

“Have you checked in with Ediltrude lately?”

“The last I heard the school was still standing”, Griffin grinned. “Though I wonder if she’d own up to it if that weren’t the case. I’d probably have to wait for Zara to rat her out to learn about it.”

Faragonda chuckled even when her eyes widened a little. Although Griffin had complained about the twins to Faragonda surely more than enough over the years, she didn’t expect Faragonda to be accustomed to the stunts they pulled; Griselda was pretty much a polar opposite of Griffin’s disaster of a second-in-command and her other half.

“You’re leaving for Cloud Tower for the night again, I assume”, Faragonda said, a slight change of pitch at the end of her sentence. “Will you come back tomorrow?”

Griffin bit her lip. The question was innocent, but the carefulness of Faragonda’s body language and the hopefulness in her gaze gave away that she knew there was weight to it as well.

“If I can”, Griffin answered, purposefully vague enough to leave herself room to decide. She’d learned her company wasn’t unpleasant for Marion at least – and by extension, most likely not for Oritel either, at least not if Marion had had a chance to talk to him. But Griffin hardly felt her presence was essential. Marion and Oritel had several lives to catch up with and their own to get back to. They had urgent duties to attend to, both personal and royal, and Griffin didn’t want to take up time from things and people that needed to come first. Frankly, she needed some time to herself, too, to get used to the idea of suddenly having her friends back.

“Good.” Faragonda didn’t seem fully satisfied, but at least the promise had made her smile. “Marion was looking for you yesterday.”

“Oh”, Griffin said, “Well, she found me.”

“You talked?” Faragonda asked with the enthusiasm of a fairy overly invested in the interpersonal relationships of people she held dear. Had Griffin not been ambushed by Marion already, she might have found it annoying. Now, however, she happily ignored it, glad she didn’t need to react to Faragonda’s veiled suggestions.

“This morning. I walked her to the library”, Griffin elaborated, realizing she didn’t know what for, whereas Faragonda’s eager expression made it clear _she_ did.

Griffin didn’t need to ask in words as a mere raised eyebrow had Faragonda clarify, “Bloom had agreed to meet Marion and Oritel there this afternoon.”

Griffin tried to hide her surprise. She had been astounded that Marion had sought her out; she had thought the woman would’ve wanted to spend time with Oritel or at least Faragonda rather than her. Griffin hadn’t seen Oritel since they’d left Faragonda’s office the day before, so not only had Marion taken time away from her husband to spend with Griffin, but the woman had also spent the morning before meeting her daughter by absolving Griffin from the sins of the man responsible for the predicament.

“How do you know?”

Faragonda held out on her answer in favor of taking a breath, her eyes keen on Griffin’s face. “I spoke with Marion last night and with the Winx this morning.”

“Aha”, Griffin said, wondering what had caused the pang of hurt when Faragonda had followed both her expectations and wishes by talking with Marion in private. Faragonda, if anyone, deserved the opportunity to share her regrets and fears. She wouldn’t have asked Marion to listen, but Griffin wouldn’t have needed to be reminded of how insistent Marion was on helping the people she cared for, to know that Marion would have pried the truth out of Faragonda one way or the other. And hopefully, free from the weight of the past, Faragonda would then have turned the tables on Marion and supported her in ways Griffin couldn’t because of her own problems.

“Are your students all right?” Griffin asked, focusing on the latter part of Faragonda’s sentence to keep the conversation in smooth waters.

“Yes”, Faragonda said warmly, “A little shaken and tired, as one would expect after getting exposed to Obsidian’s levels of dark magic. But otherwise, they’re fine.”

“That’s good”, Griffin replied. “They deserve a chance to rest and recover. The negative energy in Obsidian is substantial.”

Griffin paused to think whether she should’ve taken notice of how affected Marion had been. She’d noticed the unfamiliar aura lingering on the fairy, but given everything Marion had been through, it would’ve been perfectly conceivable if the negativity had stemmed from inside her. Griffin made a mental note to ask Faragonda to keep an eye on Marion, though, just in case. The fact that Marion hadn’t been in Obsidian in her physical form had probably helped ward off most of the ramifications, but Obsidian was a dangerous place for a fairy, especially for one with the amount of raw power Marion possessed.

Griffin hastily tuned back in to the conversation before Faragonda could notice her zoning out. Faragonda didn’t seem like she had, though, preoccupied with explaining some of the ideas she and Marion had come up with as to how to reward the Winx for their heroics.

“Truthfully, I feel biased, helping Marion and Oritel thank the Winx for freeing them”, Faragonda confessed as she walked to the sofa, “when I’m just as pleased about it. It’s not just Marion and Oritel who are indebted to them now.”

Griffin agreed. The Winx had done it all for Bloom – and maybe a little out of that weird sense of policing the world that every fairy seemed to have – but they had not only found their friend’s biological parents but undone the evil the Ancestral Witches had inflicted decades ago. They’d restored the balance of the Magic Dimension by returning the Dragon Fire to the throne of Domino and helped the planet gain back its former glory. As well as given many old wounds a chance to heal.

“It’s been really good to see them again”, Griffin said, letting every word fill with the passion and devotion of how much she meant the sentiment in order to satisfy Faragonda’s curiosity enough to discourage her from inquiring. Griffin wasn’t ready to share the conversation she’d had with Marion just yet, needing some time to reconcile with it herself before repeating it. The defense was all the more important when she sat down next to Faragonda, eliminating the possibility of a physical barrier.

Faragonda’s smile could’ve melted ice. “It has.”

Griffin let herself get lost in the flow of Faragonda’s tale as she went on to elaborate on her conversation with Marion. Faragonda’s tone was warm, and the gleam in her eyes betrayed her excitement even when her words were careful. Griffin could trust Faragonda to respect Marion’s privacy and not share anything the woman wouldn’t be comfortable with being shared, so Griffin didn’t feel awkward absorbing all the trivial details she would’ve wanted to ask Marion about if the latter hadn’t expertly steered them clear of small talk during their previous conversation.

Her thoughts refusing to stay in the moment no matter how much she tried to treasure it, Griffin suddenly realized Faragonda was doing the exact opposite of what Marion had done. After briefly explaining how Marion had come to find her late last night, Faragonda had chipperly moved on to lighter topics; she let the conversation stay shallow. Griffin couldn’t know for sure, obviously, but she doubted Marion had foregone sleep in favor of idle chitchat, so Faragonda filling the air with a recap of the less heavy aspects of their encounter made Griffin suspect Faragonda had decided something was off. 

The apparent consideration for her emotional well-being had Griffin’s insides turn into liquid and trickle to the bottom of her stomach. As per usual, Faragonda had Griffin’s best interests in mind. She’d always cared for her and taken care of her, been Griffin’s metaphorical sun and literal shoulder to cry on.

“Faragonda”, Griffin cut in during what she hoped was a natural pause in the conversation – if one could call it that when it had been Faragonda monologuing with Griffin too deep in thought to process half of what had been said, let alone pitch in. “I need to ask you something.”

Faragonda raised a worried eyebrow but nodded in encouragement. “Of course.”

Griffin stomped the flicker of embarrassment down before it could burst into flames. She felt awkward to bring it up, but she had to. She’d put it off the whole day, loitering around Alfea while trying to make sense of everything Marion had said to her. “Marion mentioned that she’d spoken with you. That you’d spoken about… me.”

“Ah yes. Marion asked about you.”

“You talked about me?” Griffin couldn’t stop herself from asking even though both Marion and Faragonda had now confirmed it – the idea was just so absurd to her. She’d specifically stayed away to keep Marion free from anything that could be associated with Valtor. But apparently, in addition to having come find Griffin on her own, Marion had brought her up in conversation, too.

“Yes?” Faragonda’s quizzical tone wasn’t an indication of uncertainty about the answer rather than a question about Griffin’s reaction. “I’m under the impression Marion sought out Saladin before he left, too. But you and Hagen have been nowhere to be found, so Marion resorted to secondary sources. And I had to resort to telling her about you since I didn’t know where you were either. I don’t know why Marion thought you weren’t avoiding me as well.” Faragonda’s words could’ve been harsh, but her tone was still as soft as always, so Griffin wasn’t offended. She was upset Faragonda had caught on to her, though. 

“What do you mean?” she asked, trying to make her question sound convincing.

Unfortunately, Faragonda was having none of it.

“What’s wrong, Griffin?”

“Nothing.”

Faragonda sighed, the exhale frustrated yet unmistakably sad as well. “Griffin, please. What is going on?”

Griffin forced herself to meet Faragonda’s eyes, which she knew to be a mistake, but she didn’t want to offend Faragonda further. “I haven’t been avoiding you. I was just… giving you space.”

“Space for what?”

“They’re back”, Griffin breathed, “It’s a miracle, and I wanted you to be able to enjoy it.”

“And you being there would somehow prevent me from doing that?”

It was evident Faragonda’s question had been sincere as she looked genuinely confused, but Griffin was talking to the bookshelves rather than Faragonda when she answered, “I just wanted to be sure. Since Valtor was the one responsible for destroying their home, and I…”

Griffin shook her head with a humorless chuckle when Faragonda didn’t rush to deny the implication.

“I just… I was worried you’d have to choose between me and them, and I didn’t want to make you do that. Or make you feel like you were obligated to continue to choose me just because the universe once chose for you by sparing me instead of them.” She looked away, ashamed of her words. She didn’t doubt Faragonda’s love for her, not after all these years, but she also acknowledged that for 17 of those she had been able to receive Faragonda’s attention and affection when Marion and Oritel hadn’t. Even though Marion had managed to convince Griffin she didn’t hold her accountable of Valtor’s crimes, and thus wouldn’t resent Faragonda for defending Griffin either, Griffin couldn’t stop worrying she was using up time Marion and Oritel could’ve spent with Faragonda to make up for the time they’d lost.

“That’s the opposite of what I-“, Faragonda’s gasp turned into a sigh when she cut herself off, “Griffin, please hear this.”

Faragonda gathered Griffin’s hands into her own, squeezing like she was afraid Griffin would slip away. The thought made Griffin’s stomach drop. Faragonda was everything to her; she’d never truly push her away. Even when she’d wanted to, she hadn’t been able to – or maybe rather Faragonda had known she hadn’t actually wanted to.

Until their fight.

Griffin had had reasons – sensible and sound enough to convince her when she had missed her best friend, but having Faragonda there now, she couldn’t understand how she’d gotten by with only the memories of what it was like. She must have forgotten; there was no other explanation for why she’d placed her pride higher, especially with Faragonda.

There was nothing to pretend, nothing to hide, nothing to try to save from the fairy for she already knew everything. She’d seen Griffin at her absolute lowest, be it physically, mentally, or morally. And yet she’d never turned away.

“Griffin…” Faragonda began, repeating her name most likely in order to gain her attention. “I was trying to tell you this earlier, but never got the chance. So let me be clear now: there’s nothing, or no one, that would come before you. The universe decided all of our faiths that day, and yes, you saw it yourself how terribly losing Marion and Oritel hurt – but don’t you even _dare_ hint that there was ever a time I would not have been utterly grateful for the grace that you being spared was. You’ve _never_ been an obligation.”

There was a fierceness in Faragonda’s voice despite the sheer heartbreak shining in her eyes, her hands gripping Griffin’s tighter while Griffin could sense the negative energy slipping between Faragonda’s fingers. With her witch background, Faragonda wasn’t the most conventional of fairies, but Griffin couldn’t remember the last time she’d witnessed it so clearly in her magic. In any other situation or with anyone else the shock would’ve made Griffin let go, but Griffin could read it from Faragonda’s face as well as feel it in the woman’s magic that the negativity wasn’t towards her but her thoughts.

Griffin locked her jaw as she blinked back tears, Faragonda’s words having hit somewhere deep. She wondered if she’d missed a spot while patching pieces of herself back together after Marion had torn her apart with frightening precision and tenderness, but truth be told, Faragonda always seemed to find the slightest of cracks through which to reach Griffin no matter how tightly she was wrapped in her defenses. Or perhaps Faragonda created the cracks herself with her mere presence.

Faragonda was always so warm and genuine. Her light not only made the shadows hunting Griffin visible against the night so that she knew what was attacking her, but it also chased them away and made her feel safe. Even Faragonda’s kindness couldn’t miraculously cure everything, but her presence at least replaced the pitch-black darkness with a fog that her brightness could penetrate, so Griffin had a direction in which to head.

Griffin hadn’t kept count of the times Faragonda had surely saved her life; she’d always been too focused on not drowning at the time to recognize what had kept her afloat. But she wondered if Faragonda knew. She wasn’t sure she would ever be able to tell her.

Faragonda had chosen her so many times – from risking her reputation by backing her up to the Company and then the Council, to risking her life by backing her up in battle. After a while, Griffin had given up on questioning why she did so and accepted that Faragonda was as ready to lay down her life for Griffin as Griffin was for her. She still didn’t understand it, though. The only other person to have consistently put her first had been her mother. Griffin hadn’t known devotion like that could exist aside from familiar love. The closest she’d come had been with Valtor, but even with him, she’d been second to power. No better herself, Griffin had chosen the world and her conscience over him.

Evidently, she wasn’t as selfless as Faragonda was – she didn’t have that infinite amount of love to share with the universe when it had so often let her down. She had found her limits by being pushed against them and reached them by crashing into them. She was finished, cornered by her past mistakes with no room to give in anymore lest she crossed some boundary. She was worried Faragonda was in a similar situation. Not in the sense that she, too, would break if she had to bend any further, but in the sense that she had no options left. Faragonda had willingly chosen her so many times that Griffin couldn’t help but agonize over the possibility that she’d only done so because she’d felt like she had had to.

But there Faragonda was, upset enough by the mere suggestion of Griffin being an obligation to have let her negative feelings leak into her surroundings. Relieved, Griffin squeezed the hand she could now trust hadn’t been forced.

“How are you always there when I need you?” Griffin asked, trying to hide the wetness of her voice by morphing her question into a chuckle.

Faragonda’s smile was as gentle as her tone as she said, “I swore I’d never let you break, remember? I intend to keep that promise as long as I’m alive.”

There was a glint in Faragonda’s eyes, but the levity she’d allowed Griffin to insert into the conversation was lost as soon as Griffin lost her gaze. She turned her head away – not out of protest but precisely because she’d heard Faragonda’s implication. She couldn’t even begin to think about Faragonda dying.

Faragonda was right, though; she had once promised to make sure Griffin wouldn’t break. Promised to be there as her strength when Griffin had lacked it herself. Promised to be the one to make sure none of the pieces she’d crumbled into got left on the ground and trampled.

No matter how broken she’d been herself, Faragonda had still always managed to mend Griffin. Griffin doubted there was anything Faragonda’s presence couldn’t cure.

Well, there was one heartbreak that had been beyond even Faragonda’s influence. It made sense, though. Faragonda had managed to piece Griffin back together time and again, but she couldn’t fix a hole if she had nothing to fill it with, so the gaping hole in Griffin’s chest would forever remain. Pain and anger could coat it, and the love from her friends could patch the bottom so that she was able to breathe without all of the air escaping through it, but it would never be sealed. Never, for it was so intricate and specific that there was only one person who could fit in it. And that man didn’t exist anymore. It hadn’t discouraged Faragonda from trying, of course, but it had been in vain. Griffin had lost too much, and she had only herself to blame for that. She was responsible for all the parts of herself Valtor had taken. Some parts she’d given willingly while others she had failed to claim back even when she’d tried, but they were lost to her all the same.

“Thank you.”

Faragonda tilted her head in confusion. Griffin smiled despite the hurt.

“Thank you for making that promise. And for keeping it.”

Faragonda had proven she cared throughout time and circumstances. They’d given each other a wide berth after the war – Griffin out of fear of Faragonda’s pain, Faragonda for her own reasons Griffin could speculate about but rather didn’t – but it hadn’t lasted long. Faragonda had been the one to bridge the divide, of course, since Griffin had known Faragonda had been avoiding her too – she would’ve never managed to keep her distance from the woman for as long otherwise – and thus hadn’t wanted to intrude. Her hesitation had been proven obsolete as Faragonda had insisted that the only way to move forward had been to do it together.

Griffin felt it best to elaborate further. “I would never have survived leaving the Coven without you and Saladin. Valtor…” It was only in Faragonda’s company where there was no tremble in her voice at the name that made her whole body ache. “Well, you know it’s complicated, but at the heart of it, what pained me the most was losing him. It’s still tender, but it was so raw back then that I doubted it would ever get better.”

“Some wounds don’t heal, no matter how much time passes”, Faragonda said ruefully. She took a long breath, watching Griffin intently before continuing, “For me, losing you would be one of those. I’ve been terrified for you at times, Griffin. I _am_ terrified for you at times. Because I can’t lose you. You’re too dear and too important to me.”

Griffin shouldn’t have been stunned by the vehemence of Faragonda’s admission, but maybe it was simpler a reaction than accepting that deep down, she’d known all of it already would’ve been. She turned her attention to playing with her fingers in her lap, twisting them like she tried to do to her thoughts to get the right words out. She was almost convinced, but since they were on the topic, Griffin figured it was worth it to dig a little deeper. She wouldn’t muster up the courage to bring it up again, so she might as well add the current conversation to the pile of wounds she’d need to tend to. It would be smarter to heal them all at once.

“Marion, um, brought up how sorry she was not to be able to be there after the war”, Griffin let her smirk convey the eye roll she was tempted to perform at Marion’s self-sacrifice. “I tried to comfort her by insisting we had you to lean onto. And Marion said…”

Griffin chanced a glance at Faragonda who was looking at her with an expectant expression; begrudgingly, Griffin realized Faragonda was going to make her say it.

Griffin took a deep breath, flitting her eyes to the wall again as she breathed out the question that was burning her tongue, “Who had _you_ to lean onto?”

She needed to hear Faragonda say it. Griffin couldn’t in clear conscience wait for her own name, but she couldn’t care less as long as Faragonda said someone else’s. As long as Faragonda had had someone. Maybe she’d confirm Griffin’s belief that she owed Saladin for more than herself. Or maybe Hagen had managed to get through to her before he’d left.

The idea of Hagen punched the air out of Griffin’s lungs as she realized Faragonda had had to relive the end of their relationship alone with Griffin too preoccupied with a past relationship of her own. She’d gotten used to life without Hagen’s brash self following Faragonda around as had been the norm 17 years ago, and since Faragonda had rarely brought it up, Griffin had assumed Faragonda had as well. How hypocritical it had been of her to nurse her own heartbreak decade after decade, all the while assuming Faragonda had been doing better simply because she was sunshine personified? Griffin frantically thought about all the times she’d wept in Faragonda’s arms. During how many of those had Faragonda been hurting, too? And yet, Faragonda would have ignored her own pain in order to see Griffin through her heartbreak.

Just as she was about to fall deep into the rabbit hole her mind was digging with her memories as shovels, someone grabbed her. Griffin blinked in confusion as she tried to make out the shape of whatever had landed on her elbow.

“You.”

Griffin frowned, trying to remember what Faragonda’s answer was for. Her brain made the connection slowly, but her muscles were quicker – she would’ve bolted from the sofa if not for Faragonda’s gentle but firm grip on her upper arm.

“I had you, Griffin. You and Saladin.” Faragonda’s words were forceful, but the squeeze of her fingers was soothing.

“But I…” Griffin wavered under Faragonda’s broken expression and swallowed the rest of her sentence. She turned her protest into bafflement. “I was always burdening you with my pain.” She barked out a humorless laugh and used her free hand to gesture between herself and Faragonda. “Still am.”

“And I will always prefer that to you carrying it all on your own”, Faragonda deadpanned. “Always. It’s not a burden. I’m only grateful that you feel safe enough to share your pain with me.”

Griffin bit the inside of her cheek to keep herself from crying.

“And do you know how I’m able to bear your pain? Because I can loan some of my own to you.”

Griffin had to close her eyes to shut out all disturbing stimuli since every ounce of her willpower was focused on keeping her breathing even. Faragonda was causing her heart to do such somersaults that there was room nowhere in her chest for something as trivial as air.

There was nothing she’d ever wanted more than a way to pay Faragonda back for everything she’d done for her during the several decades of friendship.

With her track record, that was saying something.

Surely, given the chance, she would change a number of incidents, change history even. But erasing her past mistakes wouldn’t be for her benefit. If the war had never happened, Faragonda would never have needed to carry them both through it. Oritel and Marion would have gotten to raise their daughters like every parent was meant to.

Griffin tried not to travel too far with that line of thought to avoid getting wrapped up in the darkness that had been ever-present after the war even though they’d destroyed the Ancestral Witches. She’d felt responsible for Oritel’s and Marion’s assumed deaths. Rationally, she’d tried to argue there had been nothing she could’ve done, nor had the things she had done during her time with the Coven played that big of a role – the war would’ve happened with or without her – and in the grand scheme of things, she had had stuff that had weighed on her conscience much heavier, but logic had hardly won out in the middle of her heartbreak.

Not knowing what had happened to Oritel and Marion had hurt and failing to find Daphne and Bloom had hurt – but Faragonda’s pain had hurt her more than the former two combined. By the Dragon, having to watch Faragonda suffer, to watch the fairy subject herself to the kind of regret and darkness Griffin could from personal experience detest was completely unwarranted… It had been pure agony.

Especially since Griffin had held herself accountable for it. Faragonda had always been her beacon of hope, and she knew with certainty she would have gotten washed away by her pain and surrendered to her guilt without her. In return, she’d only caused her grief. What a way to repay someone she owed everything to. 

Except, Faragonda was insisting that wasn’t the case.

Faragonda’s tentative hand on Griffin’s shoulder forced the latter to open her eyes.

“Griffin?”

Griffin fisted her hands in her lap.

All traces of uncertainty vanished from Faragonda’s voice, but the concern remained as she sighed. “Griffin…”

Faragonda inched closer, covering Griffin’s hands with her own. Griffin flipped her wrist so that she could link their fingers. There was only one thought left in her mind, Faragonda managing to have fended off all incoming attacks of her insecurity while chasing away the traces of all the old ones.

_How had she gotten so lucky?_

She didn’t say it, though, in fear that she drew the world’s attention to them. She couldn’t risk tempting the universe into taking Faragonda away from her. Instead, she mustered up every spark of light in her chest to offer Faragonda a smile that had to say everything she didn’t have the courage nor the elegance for.

Faragonda squeezed her hand, not drawing hers away even as she sat up a little straighter. “I should’ve told you years ago – I just didn’t realize you needed to hear it. I wasn’t saying it to comfort Marion; I meant it, Griffin. I don’t know what I would’ve done after the war without you.”

Griffin had perfect confidence in the fact that Faragonda would have picked herself up fine all on her own, but the idea that she’d made it a little easier was enough to warm her to the core.

Faragonda’s tone was curious when she continued, “I keep thinking though… What if we hadn’t moved on?”

Griffin blinked. “What?”

Faragonda shifted in her seat, seeming a bit uncomfortable with maintaining eye contact though she did. “Everything worked out so well for me after the war. People lost their families, homes, lives. Marion and Oritel… I barely lost anything. Except for _hope_ ”, Faragonda nearly spit out the last word, sending chills along Griffin’s spine.

Griffin shook her head so vehemently she wondered if Faragonda could hear how the pieces of her heart rattled inside her ribcage. “You did everything you could to find them, Faragonda. And when you- when _we_ failed, you did the right thing by moving on.”

Faragonda bit her lower lip. “I hear you. Marion herself said something along the lines. I just…” she sighed, a humorless smile tugging the corner of her lips, “I just can’t help wondering what would’ve happened if I’d held on to the past a little longer before running towards the future.”

Griffin tilted her head in thought. Faragonda didn’t seem haunted in the same way she’d seen her the day before. She wasn’t saying it out of malice or lack of care. She was saying it because she wanted Griffin’s opinion.

Griffin tried to imagine the scenario Faragonda was painting. Frankly, if Faragonda had succumbed to grief, everything would have been lost. But that wasn’t what Faragonda would’ve done. She was asking what would’ve happened if she’d spend more time grasping at straws to find Oritel and Marion. She was _asking_ Griffin to say they couldn’t have found them. She needed to hear something she already knew in her heart to be true – Griffin could tell, having been on the other side of a similar conversation countless times.

“I think you’ve seen that already.”

At Faragonda’s look, Griffin continued, “I’ve been stuck in the past. You moved on.” She let some lightness into her tone, certain in her words. “We’re both here, now, aren’t we?”

Faragonda watched Griffin with something akin to pride, or at the very least, wonder, before slowly whispering, “We are.”

She exhaled, allowing her smile to grow into one Griffin could once again find comfort in as she stated, defying the world and odds and everything else they’d fought against the past 17 years. “We all are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone disappointed we didn’t see Bloom actually reunite with her birth parents, fret not. I had originally planned to include it, but that part got so long that I decided it would work better on its own. I have plenty written, though I have a lot of stuff left I want to explore in that fic. But keep an eye out, you’ll never know when I get to finishing the sequel for this ;) 
> 
> For now, though, this was it. I hope you enjoyed this story, and thank you to everyone who showed their support!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [How Many Losses Does a Victory Cost?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21619435) by [DarkPoisonousLove](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkPoisonousLove/pseuds/DarkPoisonousLove)




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